Or Surely We Will Starve to Death Come Winter
by Incendiarist
Summary: America Chavez, lesbian mercenary extraordinaire, picks up a one-night stand in Vegas. What she ends up with is a new best friend, for better or for worse. [Human AU. WIP. Hiatus.]
1. chapter 1

**This chapter contains minor violence, (trans)misogynistic, whorephobic, and homophobic language, sex, and brief references to drugs and abuse.**

Characters are from Earth-616, save Steve, Sam, and Natasha, who appear in one scene in chapter 2 and are borrowed from Earth-19999/MCU. Ship inspired by the first issue of A-Force.

There is no racebending in this fic; Loki is depicted very often in comics with Inuit or east/southeast Asian features, including in a the-gods-are-human arc as explicitly Chinese. There's also a long explanation for why she's written as a trans woman, rather than any other option, like Ewing's "kind of gender fluid"; the tl;dr is that Loki's been coded transfemme since, like, ever, including pretty fucking explicitly (if transmisogynistically) in comics, and the more recent use of the gender essentialist "shapeshifters are inherently genderfluid" trope can go directly to jail, do not pass "go", do not collect $200.

Authors are an ace trans lesbian and an aro/ace cis woman. Beta and porn/plot assistance provided by an allo cis queer woman and an allo cis lesbian, respectively. All are kinky and disapprove of several decisions made by these characters. Also, certain unrealistic plot points are intentionally so, either in a plot relevant fashion or to maintain the tone of the fic.

While **everything is consensual,** and safewords are used and respected, consent is occasionally muddled by alcohol, a minor mutual attempted murder, and little-to-no negotiation of kink up to and including gunplay, bloodplay, and breathplay.

* * *

 **Chapter 1**

They met in a bar in Vegas.

America had this _consultant_ job, semi-legal, for a casino tycoon who'd pissed off some folks in low places. Why billionaires felt the need to make shady deals in the first place, America didn't think she'd ever know—it wasn't like they _needed_ to skimp—but this was the first assignment she'd had in four months where she had fucking _room service_ , so she was willing to overlook some things.

It was her last night in town, though the guy, grateful nearly to tears and probably trying to compensate for the fact a woman was taller and infinitely more badass than him, had given her an open offer for a weekend all-expenses-paid in the same luxury suite she'd been in for the past few weeks. She was meant to be taking it easy, but hours after a summer blockbuster-worthy showdown with half a dozen mafiosi her adrenaline rush had transformed into anxiety like pinpricks on her skin. Her heart was still racing, something in her hindbrain puffing up like a cat at shadowed alleys.

Some white guy, a tourist—accent said Kentucky, maybe, somewhere in the ambiguous Not Quite South—crowed triumphantly behind her, and in an instant she'd pivoted, gun half-drawn almost before she realized she was doing it. _I need a fucking drink._

There was a bar on the first floor of her hotel in Hopperesque seamless glass, three exits but all of them interior. Not necessarily ideal, but — she looked at the crowd. Businessmen, mostly, in suits and loafers, a few in casual wear but parading thousand-dollar watches. Women in skirt suits and kitten heels; the odd cocktail dress, black or red. America, in her jeans, leather jacket, and—entirely by chance—the only bra she owned fancy enough it could pass for a top in the event her shirt was shredded by a mafioso, would be out of place, but the conversation was a mid-level buzz, and the music was low enough she couldn't feel the bass in her teeth. So, fuck it.

"Negroni sbagliato," she ordered, taking an empty seat at the bar beside a harried young woman in a gray skirt suit, jacket draped on the back of her chair, heels on the floor and replaced with ballet flats. There was a phone pressed to her ear. "I don't care if he's got fucking _pneumonia_ , if he's not at the meeting, I'll—" She barked a laugh; took a sip of her martini. "Tell me about it," the woman said. "Thanks, Celeste. I'll shoot you an email."

The bartender reappeared with America's cocktail and she thanked him offhandedly, though he was already on the far side of the bar. She took a sip and winced: Prosecco, _god_ , some people had no taste. She took another sip.

Laughter cut through the chatter, low, smooth, and tripartite, and she traced it on habit to its source: a woman several seats down, sitting canted with her back to America and one elbow on the bar, her full, doting attention on the guy she was with. She had straight black hair pinned up in an artful intentionally-messy updo, a just-had-sex look that had probably taken 20 minutes in front of a mirror. Her dress might, with a bit of luck, cover the essentials when standing, and the knobs of her spine jutted out above its plunging back. She'd crossed her ankles so that one bright red stiletto of her otherwise-black heels was hooked over the stretcher, the other on the chair leg. America hoped, but doubted, they were knockoffs; real Louboutins cost more than her rent, and she lived in NYC.

The guy was mid-50s, wearing a suit which was high-quality and clearly tailored, but pulled in a way suggesting he'd recently put on weight. There was a gold band on his ring finger which, judging by the familiar hand he'd just placed on the woman's bare thigh, neither of them were paying much attention to. Rich white guy like him, with a woman at least 15 years younger: usually that meant the wife was Eastern European. This lady clearly wasn't. So she _probably_ wasn't his wife. Las Vegas indiscretions observed from half a bar down were about as far from a warehouse and weapons fire as you could get in this city, and more interesting than Celeste's coworker's opinions on midnight or sapphire blue for the new branding and _tell him we prefer the softened edges; can we get this done by Tuesday?_

"—And then the bitch threatens to cut up my credit card, you know, if I hit the limit again this month," the guy was telling his companion, right hand waving his nearly-empty highball glass around emphatically. The woman was making interested noises at all the right places, which, honestly, America found kind of impressive. "Which is fucking crazy. What's she even know about money. _Crazy_ ," he reiterated, practically snarling. "Fuckin' harpy. She wouldn't have _shit_ if it weren't for me."

"Hideously unreasonable," the woman agreed, in pitch-perfect sympathy, apparently _completely oblivious_ to the font of misogyny feeling her up. She had a half-finished Tom Collins with a little slice of lemon perched on the rim, and she was idly stirring a cocktail straw through it as she listened. The position showed off her black nail polish and her wrist cuffs — metal, delicately engraved, up and… was that an O ring? "You deserve _so_ much better." Her voice was a smooth tenor, enunciation like she'd done stage work; it dragged on 'so' and pitched up like a question, and it was the queerest thing America had heard all day.

The world's worst husband tipped his glass up one last time and drained it, then leaned forward towards his conversation partner with a suggestive leer, nodding at her drink. "Quicker you finish that, the quicker we can get out of here, kitten."

The woman hummed thoughtfully and inspected her drink like it might hold the answers to life's greatest questions: the chicken or the egg, what happened to Schrödinger's zombie cat, and why she was currently putting up with the asshole in front of her. "You know," she said slowly, "I don't think I'm feeling it tonight." She straightened, removed his hand from beneath the hem of her skirt, and brushed the fabric flat. The drunken incredulity on the guy's face was honestly MasterCard _priceless_ for about half a second, and then it slid sideways into anger; America watched him carefully, waiting for him to telegraph an attack before stepping in (and as drunk as he was, it would be very widely telegraphed).

"What'd you just say to me, you little whore?" The woman's head snapped back towards him and if she cringed it was so slow it only looked like she was stiffening in indignation. "If I'm spending this much money and you're not even going to put out, I might as well go on my _fucking_ honeymoon again."

The grey-suited businesswoman beside America quietly picked up her heels with one hand and slipped out of the bar. Several other fine patrons suddenly became engrossed in conversation, heads turned fixedly towards each other. America took another sip of her drink and watched the conversation warily, wondering what the woman was going to do.

"You haven't spent anything yet," the woman said mildly. "You could always buy your wife some flowers. She won't hate you any less, but it might get you a pity fuck." She took her purse off of the back of her chair and began to stand up. The guy lurched forward with a steadiness America hadn't expected and clamped a hand on the woman's arm.

"You're not fucking going _anywhere_ until I'm done with you, you ungrateful faggot."

They turned, then, and America caught her first glance of the woman's wide-eyed face. The other patrons of the bar were all in various states of studied non-involvement as the woman tried unsuccessfully to pull away from her asshole would-be client. America made a judgement call. She picked up her drink and slid out of her chair.

"You think you're too good for me, huh?" the guy was hissing at his captive audience. "You think you've got the _right_ to say no—"

"There you are!" said America. Both of them turned to look at her, which meant the guy missed the quick, assessing look the woman gave her. Not quite as upset as she'd seemed a couple seconds ago. Whatever; too late to back out now. America gave the woman a friendly smile, projecting 'old acquaintance'. "I've been looking all over the hotel for you, got turned around at the elevators. Who's your friend?"

The woman gave her a brilliant smile at that, seemingly unconcerned about the hand still on her arm. America had been right; she was in her mid-to-late 20s. She was Chinese or Vietnamese, with a strong jaw, aquiline nose, and cheekbones sharp enough to kill a man. In her heels, she was a full head taller than America. "Oh, nobody, really. He was just leaving." Then, casually: "But if you wanted to kill him for me, that would be even better."

It was confident enough that for a split second, America didn't even think about it; she reached for her gun, tucked in her waistband at the small of her back, before she'd quite consciously registered that the woman was _joking_ , and that she was off the job, in a civilian bar. She shifted her weight; took stock of the man instead. He seemed a bit less sure of himself facing two people instead of one. His eyes were glazed over: more drunk than she'd thought he was. That could be a good thing or a bad thing, depending.

The guy scoffed. "Listen, lady, I don't know how stupid you think I am. She's a hooker; she wasn't meeting any _friend_ here today." He looked America over. "Unless you've got some kinda two-for-one deal. What's _your_ name, sweetheart?"

America shifted so she was looming over him, just a bit. "How about this: you leave now, I don't break both your arms and toss you out that window there." She cracked the knuckles of one hand threateningly. The guy stepped forward as if to respond, stumbled, and then came up suddenly in a wild swing.

America caught his arm easily, shifted to put both hands in position, and gave an expert twist. The snap echoed loudly in the suddenly quiet room. America tossed the guy away from her, where he crashed into a bar table and kept going, toppling table and two chairs.

He was whimpering a little, as he slowly levered himself up from the floor. He glanced up at the two of them, then very visibly thought better of it. "Fuck it," he muttered. "Have fun with your fucking tranny. He's probably got AIDS anyway." The asshole started to move towards the door and then stopped and turned back, an angry triumphant light in his eyes. "You'll both be dead in a ditch in a week."

The woman's lips thinned, and she raised an unimpressed eyebrow. "You too, honey," she drawled, wiggling her fingers at his back as he shuffled painfully out of the bar.

Then, without missing a beat, she turned to America and gave her a bright smile. "My _hero_!" she said, hand to her heart and fake-swooning a little, but there was gratitude in her smile that offset some of the melodrama. She was wearing black lipstick—to go with the black dress, black shoes, black hair, black nail polish, and truly impressive black winged eyeliner, presumably—and she had piercings: spider bites on the right side of her upper lip and a labret, all metal studs. She emoted noticeably more with the left side of her face, so her smile was lopsided, nearly a smirk. It was a good smirk. America was into it. "Let me buy you a drink?" she asked. "Although… not here, probably."

The bartender was giving them a look sort of like he'd like to throw _them_ out a window. America laughed. "Sure," she said. "I'm Andrea Garcia, by the way."

"Nikole. You know, that was pretty hot."

⁂

Nikole, as it turned out, was "...an accountant". She'd told America this after her second F-bomb (and America's regrettable first) at the nightclub she'd dragged her to after they left the hotel bar, smug grin daring America to gainsay her. It wasn't America's usual kind of hangout—unmarked entryway down a narrow alley littered with cigarette butts and discarded needles, bass heavy enough her whole body vibrated with it, and crowd the other sort of underworld—but Nikole was charismatic and fucking stunning when she smiled, like she'd just heard a joke and you might have been the punchline. Under the eerie UV light her skin lit up with sharp, geometric lines forming vertices snaking their way from fingers to shoulders and over her face, disappearing under her dress. The pattern continued presumably unbroken down her legs and feet. Blacklight tattoos: America had never seen one before. She looked like a digital construct; some kind of cyberpunk fae creature, not quite real.

Nikole had noticed her looking, and—unsurprisingly—not only hadn't minded but when they reached the bar to order drinks, she'd leaned across to call the bartender, drawing America's eye to her ass and legs, and, oh, she was _showing off,_ America realized. During a lull, before the bass dropped again, America asked if she might want to come back to her hotel room with her. The answer came, laughing: "I was about to call you out on being afraid to ask."

"What if I wasn't planning on it?"

Nikole scoffed. "Yeah, right." She was practically preening. America had never seen someone _preen_ before.

This was how they ended up in the elevator, on the way to America's suite on the 37th floor.

"You said you're a bodyguard?"

"Yep." It was kind of true, for a given value of 'bodyguard', which was why it was America's favorite cover.

"Do you have a gun?"

"I might."

" _Nice_."

The person next to them, some white guy in douchey red shades, shifted uncomfortably.

America was suddenly reminded of that question she'd been wondering about since Nikole had bought her a drink. "So, uh. You haven't mentioned… I mean, we never talked about—"

"I'm off duty." Nikole looked at her sidelong, appraising. "And I don't think you could afford me."

America glanced down at her thousand dollar shoes and privately agreed. "Hard limits?"

A pause, longer than America was happy with. "No scat," Nikole said, like that even meant anything, and she must have noticed America's look, because after that she added, "no gags, and nothing gets into my eyes."

Well, _those_ America believed. "I don't do petplay," she said, "and I'll hurt you, but I won't hit you with anything but my hand."

The elevator stopped, and red-glasses shot out of it like someone was chasing him. Beside her, Nikole hummed again. "Stoplight?" she asked.

"Works for me. Are you clean?"

Nikole rolled her eyes. "Yeah. Got tested three weeks ago. And I'm on Truvada." America had the feeling she might have pissed her off, but she could suck it up, because there was no way she _wasn't_ asking, in Vegas. "Are _you_?"

"Yeah. It's been a couple months, but I don't really—" _do things like this._ "—get out much. So."

⁂

Loki let herself be pressed roughly against Andrea's door once it'd closed behind them, let her purse slip out of her hand with a shocked little gasp, more genuine than she'd like to admit. Andrea was quicker than she'd expected and with better control, left arm braced and angled up, an unrelenting pressure at Loki's windpipe. It was entirely safe, which was _adorable_. Traditionally, now she ought to be struggling: that meant something very specific to Loki, but she grabbed Andrea's shoulders, fingers sinking into the leather jacket, and pushed halfheartedly instead of snapping her neck. She was nice like that. Andrea's free hand snapped up and caught both of her wrists; the pressure at her throat fell away as they were pinned above her head. Stronger than expected, too, and if she was as well-trained as Loki had the feeling she was, she might even make Loki break a sweat in a _real_ fight. The thought was more appealing than it should have been, a hell of a lot more, and Loki hid her shiver. She didn't need to come off like she was _that_ easy.

In her heels she was eight and a half inches taller than Andrea in her combat boots, and Andrea solved this logistical issue with a hand in her hair, yanking her head down roughly to kiss her. But Loki intended to go down fighting ( _ha_ ), and when Andrea was suitably distracted by her tongue piercing she jerked full-body in an attempt to get her hands free and simultaneously bit down. It wasn't hard enough to draw blood—she wouldn't pull that with a one-night stand, especially one who hadn't gotten tested in, apparently, _months_ —but Andrea stuttered like a scratched 78, grip painful in Loki's hair, and breathed shellac-noisy into her mouth. She let go of Loki's hair then, but kept her wrists pinned with her right hand; reaching around blindly as she worried Loki's bottom lip with her teeth (Loki _deeply regretting_ her choice to wear a stud rather than a hoop), Andrea undid the neck of Loki's dress and pulled it down so the fabric pooled loose at her hips, trapped where their bodies met; pinched a nipple, digging her nails in as deep as she could. Loki whimpered.

Andrea mouthed her way along Loki's jaw and neck, sucking bruises into her skin, and Loki's hips arched up. "Are you really that desperate?" Andrea said into her neck, breath warm and humid on her skin. _Proud_.

Loki made a sound in the back of her throat.

"Your hands stay flat against the door. Move them and you'll regret it." She waited for acquiescence, and then she let go of Loki's wrists; when Loki obediently slid her hands to near-resting, palms flat to the wood, she stepped back.

That was the _opposite_ of what Loki wanted.

Andrea dislodged the bunched-up fabric at Loki's waist, pushing it down past her hips; Loki took the hint and stepped out of the dress obediently, kicking it to the side.

"Do you have any toys?" Andrea asked.

"Ah," said Loki, standing there with her back to the door, naked but for her black lace panties and her heels. "Chain for the cuffs, and a vibrator. In my purse."

It wasn't a particularly large purse. Andrea rifled through it, finding the items easily, and she put them in her back pocket. Then Andrea was touching her again, her mouth at Loki's neck, fingers trailing down her ribs with only a trace of nail; her left hand went between Loki's thighs. Two fingers rubbed at her clit through the thin, soaked fabric of her panties, not nearly enough pressure or contact and Loki arched her hips, half-desperate. One finger snaked under the fabric, skimming her labia, before slipping the crotch to the side and finally touching her clit, a brief flick of Andrea's thumbnail which might have been accidental. Loki gasped at the contact, but Andrea kept away from the area, dipping her fingers between Loki's folds. When they met the shallow recess there, Andrea made a soft sound, and for a second, everything stopped. _Oh_ , Loki thought, and waited for—

Then Andrea's fingers started moving again, small circles over her clit, and Loki resolutely pushed the issue out of her mind, dropping her head back to rest against the door and concentrating on the pleasure. She drifted after a while, world narrowing to the slick paint of the door under her splayed fingers and Andrea's ministrations. Then Andrea found a spot at the junction between neck and shoulder and _bit_ , at the same time twisting a nipple hard between her fingers and pinching her clit between Andrea's thumbnail and the smallest knuckle of her forefinger, and Loki _keened_ , digging her nails into the palms of her hand. She'd only barely processed the fact her palms had left the door before Andrea backhanded her, hard. Loki cried out, forcing her hands flat to the door rather than put her hand to her stinging cheek, and shuddered as she came.

She heard Andrea curse softly. There was a familiar series of clicks and the quiet slide of a drawer as she tried to catch her breath, and then Andrea started moving her left hand again, just running lightly along the sides of her labia. Loki tried to flinch away from the touch; in response, Andrea brought her hand higher, pinning back the hood of her clit with one fingertip and pressing in with her thumb in rough, _agonizing_ circles. At the same time, Andrea brought her other hand into Loki's field of view, now holding a gun. It was a Beretta 92FS Brigadier Inox (9mm semiautomatic, 15 bullet magazine, a sharpshooter's handgun, _goddamn_ ), and as Loki's eyes raptly followed the gun she casually pushed the muzzle against Loki's throat, pressing against the pulse point and forcing her chin up slightly. "If you can't even follow an order _that_ easy," said Andrea, "maybe you need better motivation."

Loki whined. Andrea kept the gun against her throat, seeming to admire the view, while her other hand continued its methodical, torturous movement. She _couldn't_ — Loki's eyes screwed shut and she felt herself choke back a sob; would probably be weeping if she hadn't taught herself not to do that years ago.

She didn't know how long it was before Andrea shifted, sliding the gun up to trail the barrel along her jaw, which was clenched up so tight she could hear her mother berating her fourteen-year-old self about tooth grinding, _you need to wear a mouth guard, Loki, after_ all _of the money I've spent-!_

She forced herself to relax her face. This was _fine_. Andrea was tracing the gun over her lips and Loki was _fine_ and it didn't matter that she couldn't stop herself from shaking because she was completely in control of this situation and every _other_ part of herself. She let her lips fall open, flicking a tongue out to taste. The gun had been fired recently, the sweet burn of nitroglycerin on her tongue, and that was — unexpected.

So was Andrea's breathy "Oh…"

That was when Loki got a truly _fantastic_ idea. Keeping her hands carefully flat against the door, she tilted her head forward and closed her lips around the muzzle of the gun, sucking so her cheeks hollowed. Andrea's rhythm faltered, just momentarily, and Loki looked down at her through her lashes, noting blown pupils and slightly parted lips; very purposefully took the gun deeper into her mouth, until the trigger guard impacted her labret piercing with a metallic clink, and then she moaned around it. Andrea's fingers stuttered, and stopped, all her attention focused on Loki's mouth.

A small _I win!_ crowed triumphant in the back of Loki's head.

Andrea's eyes narrowed, a 'challenge accepted' look if Loki had ever seen one, and she pulled the gun away.

Loki made a noise in protest. "You are _no_ fun."

Andrea ignored her, pressing the barrel hard against Loki's cunt and her left hand came up to pinch a nipple. Loki hissed a sharp inhale through her teeth, legs still shaking and the hard ridge of the slide like a knife against her abused clit.

"Get yourself off."

"What?"

Andrea gave her an impassive look. "You heard me."

This was not the proper handling of a gun, Loki thought, as she gripped the barrel between her thighs and rolled her hips minutely.

"Cute," said Andrea. "Try again."

"I don't—"

A boot edged between her legs; kicked them open. Loki's feet slid sideways, and her fingers scrabbled at the door, only _barely_ keeping her palms flat. Her weight fell hard on the gun which Andrea held firmly in place, and she couldn't contain her strangled cry. It took Loki several _excruciatingly_ painful seconds to regain her purchase and hold herself a more tolerable distance from the gun, but Andrea's foot stayed beside hers, preventing her from closing her stance any further.

Andrea watched her struggle, unimpressed: "Any time."

Loki moved her hips jerkily; winced, and did it again. "This," she said shakily. Swallowed. "This is a— _ah_!—a method of torture."

Andrea knotted her left hand in Loki's hair and pulled her down to kiss her again, and Loki thought this was a very transparent attempt at not answering, but it also presented an opportunity. Loki was very experienced with making out, and equally fond of it: it was sort of like fighting, but with tongues, and teeth, although she was willing to admit those ended up involved in most of her regular fights, too. And Loki kissed to _win_. If Andrea hadn't realized that yet, well. Her loss.

Andrea edged her foot out by half an inch. Loki bit down on Andrea's lower lip, and it was only luck that kept it from breaking the skin. Andrea pulled away, and took the little vibrator she'd gotten from Loki's purse earlier out of her pocket.

 _Oh_. That was _cheating_.

"I didn't say you could stop," Andrea said, pressing the toy directly onto her clit and then _holding_ it there, following the unsteady motion of Loki's hips as she bit her lip and made herself keep rocking forward on the slick barrel of the gun, every movement and the constant shaking of her thighs changing the angle of the vibe _just so_ and oh, fuck, fuck, this was needlessly cruel, she didn't _deserve_ this. She realized, distantly, that she was moaning: a constant, low whine that she couldn't quite figure out how to stop. Andrea nudged her legs another half-inch apart, angling the vibrator so the edge caught under the hood of her clit, and Loki's whine became a choked-off shriek as Andrea forced a second orgasm out of her. Loki crumpled, trying uselessly to keep her palms flat to the door, and Andrea pulled the gun and vibe away quickly and caught her, lowering them both slowly to the floor. Loki clutched her arms and _shook_.

"Good girl," said Andrea fondly, and pressed a light kiss to the side of her mouth. Loki didn't bother trying to find the breath for a response. Instead she dropped her forehead onto Andrea's shoulder and gave a shaky laugh. Andrea carded her hands through Loki's hair for a couple of seconds, then gently pushed her away and stood up. "Kneel, then look at me."

Loki folded her legs under her and rested her hands on her lap primly, looking up at Andrea through her lashes. The corner of Andrea's mouth twitched up, just a bit. She slipped the vibe back in her pocket and held out the gun, tilting it so the light caught on Loki's slick covering the barrel. "You were gagging for this earlier," Andrea said, "so why don't you clean up your mess." It wasn't a question.

Apparently Andrea hadn't forgotten about that. She tapped the barrel against Loki's lips, and, when Loki didn't open her mouth, pried her jaw open with a thumb and two fingers and pushed the barrel in. Loki was mildly disappointed that the burn of the GSR was completely gone, replaced by her own taste. "Now, are you gonna suck it or do I have to do this for you?"

Loki adopted an expression that said she was considering the question; Andrea tangled her fingers in Loki's hair to hold her head still and shoved the gun in farther. Loki's tongue piercing clinked against the barrel, metal-on-metal, as Andrea fucked her mouth with it. Loki briefly considered helping, but honestly, after Andrea's lack of gratitude for the _last_ show she'd given her, she didn't see why she should give her the satisfaction.

"I think you should take off my pants now," Andrea said after what couldn't have been longer than a minute, voice low and asphalt-rough. Loki was sure she had _no_ idea why. "And then you can eat me out."

That, Loki thought, was definitely a plan. She worked at Andrea's zipper and buttons with still-shaky hands, pulling them down far enough to reveal plain cotton panties soaked all the way through. Loki smirked around the gun in her mouth; ran her fingers along the fabric to feel Andrea shudder above her.

Andrea pushed the gun as far in as it would go and held it there; Loki could feel it hit her soft palate. She relaxed her throat instinctively, breathing through it. "Stop fucking around."

Well, if she was going to be like _that_ about it. Loki rolled her eyes and hooked her fingers in the panties' elastic, shoving them down Andrea's thighs. Andrea pulled the gun out of her mouth and used the hand fisted in her hair to direct Loki's movement. As if she needed _direction_. She didn't do anything, for a moment, in protest. Andrea had been just fine with waiting _earlier_. Finally, generously, she gave a single light lick along the full length of her labia, angling it so her tongue stud caught momentarily under the hood of her clit, and Andrea's quiet gasp was _terribly_ gratifying.

She sat back on her heels.

Andrea, voice strained: "I swear to God, Nikole, if I don't come in the next thirty seconds I'm bringing the gun back."

Loki almost asked her what she intended to _do_ with the gun when Loki had her head buried between Andrea's legs, but thinking over the last twenty minutes… Maybe there were some questions she didn't mind going unanswered. She took Andrea's clit into her mouth; Andrea jerked, muscles spasming, and her grip in Loki's hair tightened. Loki ignored her and hummed, digging her nails into Andrea's skin, scraping down the backs of her thighs.

" _Shit_ ," Andrea breathed, and then she was coming with a shudder and a drawn-out moan. Loki kept going. "Fuck, fuck, that's enough, you can stop."

Loki gave a final lick, and, somewhat impulsively, planted a quick kiss on her clit before withdrawing. She wiped her mouth, Andrea's come and the last of her lipstick rubbing off on the back of her hand.

Andrea offered her a hand to pull her to her feet. Loki took it, because that was polite, as was the way she used the hand to steady her when for a moment her legs didn't want to support her weight. Andrea probably liked to feel she was helping, was all, and Loki was selflessly obliging her.

She glanced at the bed, very obviously. "So about that cuff chain…"

⁂

In the morning, America had a new, vibrant collection of scrapes and bruises, and when she inspected herself in the mirror after her shower she wasn't entirely sure which ones had come from work or sex. She went to hang up the towel, considered for a moment, and then wrapped it around her body before she stepped out into the bedroom.

Fuck knows why she'd even bothered. Nikole was standing beside the bedside table, talking to someone on the room phone dressed in sunlight and nothing else. Framed with the window behind her, it caught on her unbound hair and made it look almost like she was glowing. "Yes, that'd be perfect… How about a little of every kind you have?" She caught America's eye then, and wiggled her fingers. She turned back to the phone. "Thank you so much… Oh, just charge it to the room."

She hung up and beamed at America. "Andrea! Good morning. I ordered us some breakfast, I've heard _fantastic_ things about their biscuits."

"Uh-huh," America said. "You didn't think you wanted to _ask_ before charging it to _my_ room?"

Nikole's smile didn't falter. "I don't have a wallet on me." She gestured vaguely at her naked body. "Anyway, you know what they say: better to beg forgiveness than ask permission."

"Oh, you'll be begging all right." It was cliché, but it was also 7:30. Sue her.

She considered all her options, taking in the room, and Nikole's shamelessness, and, in particular, the private balcony off the room. Through the wide glass double door, America could see a sturdy metal railing, a small postmodern-chic balcony table with two chairs, and a view into and across the square courtyard the hotel surrounded — there were open curtains in several of the rooms, and a few people lounged with coffee and airport-kiosk novels in the brisk morning air.

Nikole watched her expectantly, eyebrows half-raised like she was mildly interested. The _nerve_.

"On the balcony," said America. "There's such a thing as basic fucking decency, and if you don't know that already then you need to learn that there are consequences for your actions." When Nikole didn't move: " _Now_."

Nikole shrugged and turned towards where her dress had been kicked carelessly against the wall.

"Without your clothes," America clarified.

"Yes, ma'am." She sketched an exaggerated bow, then sauntered casually through the glass door, not bothering to close it behind her.

America rolled her eyes and fetched her own clothes from the floor, as well as Nikole's wrist cuffs and chain. She took her time getting dressed before joining Nikole out on the balcony.

She hadn't had the gall to sit down in one of the chairs without America's permission, which was… honestly a bit surprising, but she also hadn't done anything else, just stood there with her hands resting at her sides. America figured that kneeling without being given an order to was a bit much to ask.

America held up the cuffs. "Here's how this is gonna go: I'm going to chain you to that rail, and then I'm going to have the coffee and biscuits that you decided _I'd_ be paying for. You're going to sit at my feet like a good little slut, and maybe I'll decide to feed you. Unless you manage to fuck even _that_ up."

Nikole's eyes widened. _Shit, was that too far?_ America had stayed away from dirty talk intentionally the night before, not sure how Nikole would react or what her limits might be, or if the guy last night was representative of a typical client. She paused. "Unless you'd like to safeword out."

"Would—" Nikole started, and stopped, her voice rough and low. She cleared her throat, and continued, wry: "Would you like me to call you 'daddy' too?"

Well, apparently she wasn't safewording. "...That's— that's not necessary." America was off-balance, which, _fucking hell,_ Nikole had done it _again_. America would really prefer if Nikole took her control issues out on someone other than her.

Nikole made a show of dropping to her knees with her back facing the rail, holding out her wrists with her hands in loose fists. She blinked up at America through her lashes. "Whenever you're ready," she drawled.

It wasn't worth engaging; America knew she was trying to get a rise out of her. She fastened the metal cuffs onto Nikole's wrists. She jerked Nikole's arms behind her back and quickly looped the chain through one of the bars of the railing. She checked the chain was secure, and then she heard a knock on the hotel room door through the open balcony door.

"Don't move," she said, unnecessarily, before walking back into the hotel room to answer the door It was a kid, pushing a cart with a steaming pot of coffee and covered plates. She opened the door wide to let him wheel it in; Nikole could deal. The kid locked the wheels of the cart and then glanced out to the balcony and froze, eyes wide. America followed his gaze to see Nikole sitting quietly on her shins, shoulders curled in and eyes fixed on the ground in front of her. America smirked a bit; not so cocky now, was she?

The kid left pretty quickly after that, telling America hurriedly that she could just call down when she was done with the cart. She pulled her laptop out of its case and balanced the coffee and plates on top of it as she walked carefully back to the balcony, depositing everything on the table. Then she grabbed one of the chairs and dragged it in front of Nikole so she could sit with the table beside her and keep an eye on her private show. She poured herself some coffee, ignoring the provided cream and sugar, and started idly removing the covers from the plates, inspecting the biscuits. She had to admit they _did_ look delicious.

Nikole was eyeing her coffee mug with something like disdain. "That's disgusting," she commented blandly. "How can you even drink that?"

America put down her mug. They were doing this the hard way, then. "You're here to look pretty, not to run your mouth. I don't think I _asked_ for your _opinion_." She looked Nikole up and down then, lingering on her legs. "You know, I'm not seeing very much of that body you're so fucking vain about, _chica_. Legs out from under you."

Nikole stared at her, not moving. "You told me to sit. I'm sitting."

"And now I'm telling you to sit _differently_. Or I'll move you myself."

Nikole scowled at her, but she began to slowly straighten her legs, leaning forward as much as the short give on her chain would let her and wincing as her shins and knees scraped against the ground from the bad angle, until she was sitting with her ass on the cement and her legs bent semi-fetal in front of her. America used one foot to kick her legs apart to give her a good view of her exposed crotch and, _fuck_ , the dried slick flaking off white on her thighs from last night. Nikole made a quiet sound at the back of her throat, then pressed her lips together and looked away.

America had just brought her mug back to her mouth when Nikole decided to speak up again. "You know," she said, quietly smug, "you could have left the magazine in, last night. I wouldn't have minded."

America choked on her coffee. She'd made sure to eject the magazine behind her back, while Nikole was distracted. Her _eyes had been closed_. What, she'd recognized that by _sound_? Nikole still wasn't looking at her, but there was a note of satisfaction in her eyes and the turn of her mouth. Chained and on display for anyone who happened to glance over, and she was still playing this like it was a game she could win.

That was cute.

America took another sip of her coffee and hummed noncommittally. She flipped open her laptop, grabbed a biscuit as it booted up, and very pointedly ignored Nikole. She pulled up a few news sites and propped her feet up on the other chair, settling in. With the number of biscuits Nikole had ordered, this would take a while.

Nikole shifted her weight, the chain scraping over the metal of the railing, and tried again. "Are you actually going to eat all that yourself?"

America didn't even glance at her; took a bite out of her first biscuit. She _wasn't_ going to eat them all, probably, but Nikole didn't need to know that. She could fucking wait.

She scrolled methodically through every single local and world news article, more thoroughly than she would normally. She was contemplating the sports page when she glanced at Nikole out of the corner of her eye. Nikole hadn't said another word, and hadn't closed her legs even though there was now an elderly white couple playing chess on the balcony two rooms down who could clearly see her should they bother to look over, which surprised America a bit given how uncomfortable she'd clearly been with the room service kid. She opened her email thoughtfully, catching up on communications she'd missed while she was on the job, and Nikole had been good for a while, so she made small talk. A snide comment about Bill de Blasio while she skimmed Newsweek led to the discovery that they were both from NYC, America in Tribeca and Nikole with a walkup in the Flushing Chinatown ("to get in touch with my _roots_ , y'know," she'd said sarcastically, "fix the disaster that is my Mandarin, et cetera…"). America put her foot in her mouth and asked where Nikole was born, and got a flat "San Francisco," which. Yeah. Dick move. America lived 3 blocks away from the house her moms had raised her in, and should fucking know better.

Nikole's favorite color was green. It took maybe two minutes before America _believed_ her, and then Nikole laughed so hard she lost her breath when America admitted she unironically loved the red-white-and-blue look. They traded questions and anecdotes, the sort of everyday, non-incriminating details that you share to break the ice, until America noticed Nikole's replies had started to come further and further apart, taking on the distant quality of someone starting to sink into subspace. Halfway through explaining to America why Harley Quinn was objectively the best character in DC Comics, Nikole trailed off, her voice sort of getting quieter until America couldn't hear it at all.

America looked at her full-on for the first time since Nikole had made that comment about the magazine. Her head was back against the bars and she was looking off to the side at nothing in particular. Without her makeup the shadows beneath her eyes were surprisingly prominent. America wondered how much sleep she tended to get. There were tiny white scars dotting the skin around her lips; more piercings she'd taken out, presumably. There were more scars, too, farther down. A jagged line across her ribcage on the left side. A thin white line circling her right ankle that almost looked like a tattoo. She was shivering minutely, goosebumps down her arms and legs and her nipples prominent in the early morning chill. Her knees and shins were scraped red-raw in places, and she had them loosely angled away from herself, relaxed in a way she hadn't been when America had first kicked her legs apart. Her eyes fell between Nikole's thighs — she shaved, or waxed, or something, which offered America a fucking _stunning_ view of exactly how turned on she was.

Nikole blinked lazily, catching America's eye, and she followed her gaze, seeming to notice her own reaction for the first time. She swallowed (though she didn't tense up) and started to bring her knees in again to hide it. Fuck that, America thought, and leaned forward. She kicked Nikole's legs apart again, wider this time, since Nikole had decided to be self-conscious about it. Then she pressed her right foot firmly down against her cunt and left it there. Nikole made an aborted sound and stared at her with wide eyes.

"Problem?" America asked her casually, not looking at her foot or letting up on the pressure.

Nikole's mouth worked for a few seconds, and then she shook her head wordlessly. She didn't move her spread legs. Good.

The coffeepot was on a hotplate, America noticed, glancing back at the table. It should still be at a good temperature. And there were still six biscuits left, since Nikole had apparently ordered extra. She turned over the second mug.

"Coffee?" she asked.

Nikole licked her lips, and her "Please," came strained. America added cream and sugar as directed, and stared at the _third fucking spoonful_ of sugar she was mixing in.

"Seriously?" she asked Nikole.

Nikole shrugged. "I occasionally feel happiness," she said, with some concentration.

America laughed. She blew on the coffee to cool it off and then leaned down to hold it up to Nikole's lips.

Tipping coffee into Nikole's mouth was an act that got easier with practice, but it only took a few tries before she found a workable motion. She broke off bite-sized pieces of one the remaining biscuits and fed them to her in between sips. At one point Nikole shifted position, moving ever so slightly underneath America's foot, and America pulled the coffee mug away from her lips.

"Don't even think about trying to get off that way."

Nikole stilled immediately, and America returned the mug to her lips as a reward.

It was a surprisingly pleasant way to spend a morning, America realized, as she poured Nikole a second cup of coffee and broke up another biscuit. Nikole was quiet and increasingly affectionate as the morning passed. By the time America popped the last piece of biscuit into her mouth, Nikole was curled forward with her chin on her breastbone, eyes closed and half asleep. America eyed the goosebumps covering her shoulders and arms and thought, a little regretfully, that they should move this inside soon.

Nikole roused quickly when America called her name, and bent forward so she could unhook the chain from the railing. America sent her inside while she stacked dishes and brought everything back inside.

⁂

"You know," said America as Nikole, freshly showered, pulled on her panties—discarded beside the bed last night—and a crop top, borrowed from America's own luggage. You could tell, see, because it was red, and covered in stars. Nikole had turned up her nose a bit at it, presumably because it contained actual colors. _My favorite color is green_ , America's _ass_. "I thought you were serious, for a second, when you asked me to kill that guy."

"I was," she said distractedly, and examined a little plastic container of lingonberry jam. America wasn't 100% on what a lingonberry was, but Nikole seemed to like it well enough, because she'd already licked three of the things clean. "They didn't cut a pull tab into this one. That's _cruel_."

 _I was_. America stared at Nikole for a few seconds, as Nikole pulled herself onto the bed to sit cross-legged and tried to rip the packet open with her teeth. Yeah, that totally seemed plausible. Cold-blooded killer, right there.

She'd been thinking, as Nikole had showered, about the last, what, twelve hours? They'd been fucking amazing, is what they'd been, and she couldn't help but wonder what might happen if she just. Stayed here, until her room expired. Two days was a long time, if Nikole was up for it.

"It's not actually my credit card that's paying for the room," she began, casually. Nikole glanced at her briefly as she leaned across the bed to throw the jam packet into the garbage. "I did a gig for the guy who owns the place just before I met you. He gave me the room for free. Plus the other stuff."

Nikole sat up, significantly more interested. " _Really_ ," she said. " _Please_ , go on."

America crossed her arms and leaned against the wall beside the bathroom door. "The thing is," she said, "he gave me it for the next two days. No strings. You free for a couple of days?"

⁂

 _"You have fun, you hear me? And see if you can't bring her home."_ And to think America had wondered whether she'd be able to suddenly take a couple days off of work. Putting off a debrief, too. Apparently she had 'a fuckton of vacation days' and 'seriously, we're worried about you, use them'. So that happened.

"That's not gonna happen. But thanks. See you soon." She ended the call with a thumb flick and looked at her new roommate for the next couple of days.

Nikole was fiddling with her own cell, still perched on the bed. She glanced up as America slipped her phone back into her pocket. "Was that a chill boss or a chill girlfriend?"

America gave a little snort. "Boss. I don't really do the dating thing," she admitted. "It's not— It's never really worked out."

Nikole hummed in sympathy. "Ditto. Admittedly," she said, "I've also never _tried_ exceptionally hard. It doesn't feel worth the effort."

America's last relationship had been kind of a clusterfuck, and she'd only been relieved when it was over. "Yeah, I know the feeling."

⁂

About an hour before they should probably be worrying about lunch, America had just started thinking about the clothing situation, and whether she should ask Nikole if she needed to go get something, when there was a knock on the door. Nikole bounced off of the bed to go answer it, and America watched with some bemusement as a tall, imposing white woman in a black suit, a poorly hidden gun, and black sunglasses wordlessly handed Nikole two large shopping bags and a small, unmarked box.

"Will you be needing anything else, ma'am?"

"I don't think so, no," said Nikole. When the woman kept standing there, she added: "You can go." She wiggled her fingers in a dismissive gesture, and the woman bowed deeply before turning to walk smartly down the hall.

Nikole brought the packages over to the bed, apparently oblivious to the fact that America was staring at her the whole way. She set the box to the side and began rummaging enthusiastically through the large bag, removing what looked like folded clothes.

"What just happened?" America asked, since it didn't look like an explanation would be happening otherwise.

"Huh?" Nikole looked up from where she'd been holding a green ( _huh_ ) miniskirt up to her waist experimentally. "Oh, just one of my mother's underlings. I texted her earlier and asked her to buy a few outfits for me to wear while I'm here."

There were a lot of things to say to that. America started with possibly the easiest. "Don't you have a hotel room?" Presumably with her own clothes in it, no purchase required. And also: "Your mother?"

America had kind of assumed that Nikole wasn't in contact with her family anymore. She didn't have a reason which wasn't _well, you're trans, your parents probably hate you_ , and that was a pretty fucked up assumption, honestly. Good on her, if she had a relationship with her parents! Her… very rich parents, apparently. With butlers. Armed butlers, who could be asked to run errands for their daughter, in Las Vegas, where America assumed they didn't live, given she had a hotel room. Armed butlers who _fucking bowed_ to her.

Nikole waved airily. "There's nothing in my hotel room that can't be replaced, and it's all the way across the city. This way, I don't have to travel all the way back there. My mother will handle the cancellation, it's N-B-D."

America stared at her for several seconds. "When you say 'mother'," she said, slowly and a bit desperately, "do— do you mean your _sugar momma_? Or your domme…?" There was nothing about this situation that made sense anymore.

"No?" said Nikole, stepping out of her panties and replacing them with a delicate thong of indeterminate expensive material. "I mean my mother."

"So you're, like. A trust fund kid." Nikole was very clearly some kind of adrenaline junkie (not that America could talk). Maybe she put her life in danger on a regular basis for fun.

"Well. No. Look, my mom has a lot of money. She's, you know, important. And," Nikole's voice was briefly muffled as she pulled a mostly-sheer black top over her head, "she _earned_ her money." It sounded like something she'd heard a dozen times. "So, as long as I do my part, she'll buy me pretty much anything,"—Nikole waved at the bag of clothes and the fancy designer label on the side of it—"but she doesn't trust me with cash. Which means she _basically_ owns my soul."

So, no trust fund. No actual money at all. So Nikole not only had a job, but a pretty fucking dangerous job. For spending money? Because 'doing her part' couldn't mean her mother had her doing — what? Sex work for the family business? That was an episode of SVU or something.

"Oh, I almost forgot!" Nikole set the bag of clothes aside and turned to the suspiciously unmarked box. "I also asked for a few other things I thought might come in handy while we're here." She removed the lid and pulled out several small objects, most of which America didn't recognize. The ones she _did_ recognize included a set of clamps and a small, but exotically shaped strap-on dildo. After that, Nikole pulled out a collection of brightly-packaged condoms, a small plastic bag with colorful tablets inside, and a note. Nikole unfolded it.

"Enjoy! X-O-X-O, Mom," she read out loud.

And, you know what? America didn't _really_ need to know the details of her family life.

⁂

Lunch was at a cute sandwich store attached (of course) to the hotel, with cartoons illustrating the menus and umbrellas over the patio tables. Nikole ordered a BLT, extra bacon. She picked out and ate every piece of bacon, then moved on to the rest of the sandwich's contents. America chewed her meatball sandwich and watched Nikole scrape the mayonnaise off her bread and lick it off her fingers.

"She's just," Nikole was saying about her mother, as she started to strip the skin off of a tomato slice, "so _concerned_ I won't find someone 'nice' to settle down with. That I'll be 'lonely'." America nodded, remembering Teddy's look of genuine concern the day she'd told him about her last breakup.

"And it's not like I don't appreciate it," she continued. "Her heart's in the right place. There was this whole," she waved the strip of tomato skin in the air, " _thing_ , in the past, you know. She's always regretted not getting married. It's just. I'm _not her._ "

"I have this friend," America told her, "sweetest guy you'll ever meet. He's got the most _disgustingly_ romo marriage. Get them in a room together and they make fucking doe eyes at each other. And he kind of assumes that that's the ideal for everyone else too. Like. I've told him. I'm aromantic. I don't do that stuff."

Nikole fucking _giggled_. "'Romo marriage'. That's good."

⁂

"…and if you're married you get all the tax benefits. It's just unfair," Loki said, propping her head up on one arm and idly playing with a strand of Andrea's hair.

"System's fucking rigged," Andrea agreed dryly, and rolled over to stare up at the ceiling.

Loki was riding a wave of post-sex endorphins and she intended to enjoy it for as long as possible. Preferably without moving.

"There were those two celebrities, weren't there?" she mused. "Whatever their names are, I don't know. But they got married just for the tax benefits. It was very scandalous." She thought she remembered something like that, anyway. It wasn't important. What _was_ important was the idea she'd just had. "Hey," she said, shoving Andrea's shoulder lightly. "Hey, Andrea. Pay attention to me."

Andrea hummed. "What?"

"What if we got married?"

" _What_?" she repeated, sounding _much_ more awake this time.

"Listen. It's perfect. We're in Vegas, right? We could get married _literally_ on the spot, anywhere. By Elvis if you wanted, or a fucking _Jedi_. We go back to New York with a convenient excuse for our lack of interest in dating, a tax break, and an excellent sex partner. No strings, no sudden expectation of romance, or commitment. We don't even have to move in together if we don't want to. Nothing has to change at all."

Andrea lifted her head and stared at her for several seconds, before flopping back down onto the pillow. "Oh, what the hell. Why not? It's Vegas."


	2. chapter 2

**This chapter contains action movie-style violence, familial abuse, whorephobia, sanist language from a point-of-view character, and brief references to sexual assault and suicide.**

* * *

 **Chapter 2**

America woke up to birdsong and sunlight filtering pleasantly through delicate gossamer curtains which skimmed the floor, shifting restlessly in the light breeze. _This isn't right,_ she thought for a bleary half-second, because she had blackout curtains and her window was bolted shut. A wash of paranoid adrenaline, and she woke up enough to remember she'd slept in her wife's room last night. She could worry about _that_ instead.

Nikole had come in around 1 AM with ligature marks and bruises forming on her bare wrists and throat, and she'd just stood there for a minute and looked at America blankly before rubbing at her eyes and asking if they could sleep together — "Not sex," she'd clarified, "just to sleep, if that's—" she'd stopped and scowled at the expression that must have been on America's face. "There's nothing _wrong_ , Andrea. Why do you always assume there's something wrong?" she'd said, voice heavy with exhaustion like _America_ was the one being unreasonable here. Like Nikole asking to, what, _cuddle_? was normal; like her apparently having gotten fucking strangled didn't have anything to do with it. She pulled shit like this _all the time_ , like she was literally incapable of just admitting something had gone wrong.

Whatever. Nikole wasn't going to say anything, not unless she absolutely _had_ to.

America shoved her hand under the pillow and slid her phone out, lifting her head just enough to peer at the time glaring at her from the too-bright screen. It was almost 8; late, for her, but Sunday was her day off and she'd had a late-night sparring session with Teddy. It had left her worn out and sore, but it'd curbed the restlessness that had lodged itself in her bones after too long without any real long-term assignment. Over the sound of the birds she could hear the quiet drone of a reporter and the sizzle of oil and grease creeping in under the threshold of the closed door. She pulled herself up with a groan and sat on the edge of the unmade bed to stretch her stiff limbs and crack her spine.

While Nikole's bed was a disastrous, haphazard pile of too-fluffy blankets and no fewer than twelve pillows—America had never even seen it made—the rest of her room was straight out of an interior design magazine: a padded bench sat at the foot of the bed and a matching chest of drawers rested against one wall, bare save the gilded vintage mirror which hung above the chest. The textured wooden floors glowed golden in the natural light through the tall, open windows on each side of the bed, themselves bordered by the perfectly-measured curtains. There were no photos, no clothes in piles on the floor; nothing, really, that suggested a real person lived there, and nothing decorative save an old, Goodwill-procured camera that sat atop the fashionably distressed chest of drawers, and a crystal chandelier.

America thought briefly about going into her own, rather more lived-in room and trying to find clean clothes, but decided against it once she was in the hallway. The smell of bacon and Nikole's definitely-not-a-box-mix pancakes wafted up the grand staircase along with the staticky sound of her ancient vacuum tube radio announcing the morning news. Nikole was barefoot in front of the stove, wearing a red-and-blue hoodie of America's (sleeves bunched up to her elbows) and a "Kiss the Cook" apron, a pot of the light-roast hazelnut coffee she liked on the counter beside her. She'd added cream and sugar directly to the pot.

America trudged to the kitchen table—this was not the same thing as the _dining room table_ , which served eight and was to be left completely untouched except on special occasions—and took a seat. She yawned. "'Morning."

"How'd you sleep?" Nikole asked, not looking up from the bacon.

"Fine," America said, which was true, and "You're up earlier than I expected," which wasn't. Nikole was always, _always_ up before America, even when she'd gotten home well after America had gone to bed; her caffeine dependency and the dark circles under her eyes never went away, so she said she didn't see the point in sleeping _extra_.

Nikole made a disinterested noise in the back of her throat. "Do you want orange juice?" she asked idly as she forked two pancakes neatly onto one plate, and dumped the remaining five messily onto another. The thought of eating five pancakes made America's stomach twinge a bit in protest.

"Please."

Nikole deposited the plate with two pancakes in front of her before sitting across and dumping approximately half the bottle of syrup over her own. "Go get it, then," she said, foregoing the silverware that had _already been set out_ to pick up the sticky mess with her hands instead. America winced, and then looked at Nikole's bruises and winced more. She got up and trudged to the fridge.

"Pour me some too while you're up," Nikole called out from behind her. "My coffee's almost gone." When America turned back, she was glaring out the window facing their neighbor's house, and America wondered if Susanna Johnson had reshingled or something. Putting her own glass on the table and dangling Nikole's in front of her, fingers around the rim, America raised her eyebrows and kept them raised until Nikole bothered to glance back towards her. Nikole narrowed her eyes resentfully.

"What's your archnemesis done now?"

"Nothing," said Nikole. She downed the remains of the coffee pot with a spiteful air and then plucked the glass out of America's hand.

"Uh-huh." America sat back down and took a bite of 'homemade' pancake.

"She had six boxes delivered to her door yesterday. Six. They weren't small boxes, Andrea." She held her hands out to demonstrate precisely how not small the boxes were. "And _then_ ," she said, "after she got them all inside, she came out again and she _smiled_ at me. What the _fuck_ is she planning?"

America blinked. "I don't know. A birthday party?"

Nikole made a face. "Doubtful. I mean, who would it even be for? She doesn't have kids."

"People have friends, Nikole."

Nikole _hmm_ ed suspiciously, and America dropped it, because Nikole believed with all her heart that friendships only existed with ulterior motives, and if three years of marriage hadn't changed her mind, an argument over breakfast wouldn't.

Speaking of parties… "Hey, when's that barbecue the new guy is throwing? Is that today?"

"5 o'clock," Nikole said promptly, because she knew everything scheduled to happen in this neighborhood. "He said he'd bring hot dogs for me." She sounded suspicious of this as well, as if Steve's offer to acquire the cheap, super processed stuff _just_ for her was an elaborate lie meant to do… something, probably. America stuffed a forkful of pancake into her mouth to hide her smile, and thought that, as covers went, this one had its moments.

⁂

Despite looking outwardly identical to every other house on the block, Steve Rogers' place managed to radiate an aura of earnest commitment to neighborhood harmony. Steve himself was the picture of a model citizen, and had a dogged friendliness and lack of guile that sent red flags waving all across Loki's mind because it _had_ to be hiding something. She was determined to dislike him.

He was making it difficult.

The barbecue was in his yard, the same as the last one had been. It had a white picket fence, and a couple of nice bushes, and an oak tree that stood near the side of his house. On the grill were four different varieties of sausage, thick burger patties, a variety of chicken cuts, and actual steaks, because Steve thought barbecues should be the same as going to a restaurant. Loki had glanced over the collection just long enough to confirm that _her_ hot dogs (small, greyish, and carefully quarantined from everything else in a corner) were actually present, as promised, and then had drifted away from Andrea toward the oak tree.

It was, she understood, the perfect weather for a barbecue. The nearest cloud was floating over a house about a block away, and it was at least 50 degrees outside. Sensible people, like Andrea, had come in long pants and light jackets. Loki's shirt had no sleeves and her skirt didn't reach her knees, because weather was for the weak. She glanced around, taking in every face even as she looked for someone quite a bit smaller than the adults.

Most of the neighborhood was already there, talking and laughing with each other in loose clumps of people that Loki avoided on instinct. It wasn't that she didn't like people — she _did_. It was just that even though she knew, logically, that nobody here was planning anything dangerous, she couldn't quite make herself believe it. She was unconsciously straining to pick up every conversation. The over-loud laughter of Mr MacAlister just behind the grill, recounting some story ( _'should have seen it'_ , _'two kegs of beer'_ , _'right?'_ ). Steve's husband, Sam, approaching Andrea farther to the left ( _'looks like you'd rather be somewhere else'_ ). The redheaded woman who, according to gossip, spent quite a lot of time at the Rogers' place talking in low tones to Steve (she couldn't pick up words from the redhead, which was disconcerting, but from Steve there was _'paranoid'_ and _'get to know her'_. Odd.) And then a small, fast moving figure wrapped in a navy dress and ribbons came flying through the crowd towards her.

Eleanor Lowell stopped when she got to the tree, beaming up at Loki with an open, gap-toothed smile. She was all of eight years old and six months ago she'd decided that Loki was the greatest person in the _whole entire world_ , fuck if Loki knew why. The entire reason she was at this barbecue, beyond checking to see if Steve's hot dog promise had been full of shit, was this kid. Last week she'd found Loki in the park, and relayed her tearful story about a bully at school who'd picked her to push around, and the amused laughter of the teachers she'd tried to tell, because didn't she know that was just how boys showed affection.

Loki'd never gone to school, and her bullies had been considerably bigger than her, but she knew how to make someone hurt and she was pretty sure she could figure out how to make that harmless enough for eight year olds. Punch him where it hurt and maybe he'd think twice about tripping her in the halls. It worked in the movies, anyway. And a neighborhood barbecue was as good a place as any to teach a kid to knee someone in the crotch.

Loki glanced around as she stepped away from the tree to find a relatively clear space to spar in, spotting Eleanor's grandmother walking towards them at a far more sedate pace than her granddaughter. Mrs Lowell smiled at her, and then Loki's attention was grabbed back to the kid as Eleanor tugged on her skirt and started talking rapidly about her… book report, probably, was what Loki was getting from this, and how the characters in her book had beaten Godzilla with kung-fu and was _she_ gonna learn how to do that?

"Pretty sure you need a rocket launcher for Godzilla," Loki replied. "It's just black eyes on eight year olds today."

 _"_ _You ever think of having one?"_ Sam's voice filtered through her mental catalogue of the surrounding conversation. Then, Andrea's voice: " _Nikole wants one,"_ and Loki remembered the look of panic in Andrea's eyes the only time she'd brought _that_ topic up. It was why they had a cat now. And a neighbor kid, apparently.

Eleanor's school had a gym class that taught warm up exercises, so Loki had them both run through an abbreviated set: mostly the arms. She didn't _think_ Mrs Lowell would yell at her for spraining her granddaughter's arm teaching her to punch, but better safe than sorry. Never let it be said she couldn't set a good example.

She ran through the session she'd put together based on the sparring sessions she'd done as an eight year old and the sparring sessions Google told her were acceptable for an eight year old. Civilian eight year old. Whatever. Height was the main difficulty here, because she wasn't teaching Eleanor to fight adults and she didn't have any other kids to use.

"Who told you tomatoes were a good starting plant in a garden?" Susanna was telling some acquaintance to the right, and Eleanor was asking Loki when they were going to get to the _punches_.

Loki relented, and walked through the routine she had put together in her head after her research. Eleanor was a quick study, or maybe just highly motivated about punching bullies.

"Okay, now try on me," Loki told her after a while, and crouched down a little to present something at least a little bit more akin to another kid's height. Eleanor very carefully made a fist the way Loki had taught her, moving through the motions a couple of times, face creased in solemn concentration. Then she suddenly sprang into motion and landed surprisingly hard blows on Loki's arms and then stomach.

Loki doubled over dramatically, clutching her stomach. "How can this be? You have defeated me!" she cried, collapsing to the ground. Eleanor giggled and ran over to stand over Loki's face, and Loki cracked an eye open and grinned conspiratorially at her.

She realized a couple of seconds later that she now had a bit of a problem. She was on the ground in six inch heels and a decently short skirt, and now needed to get up in such a way that she still had her decency. She _could_ do that, pretty easily, but she wasn't sure if that was something people who _hadn't_ gone through boot camp at 8 could do. _Maybe I can say I was in ballet_ , she mused. She tilted her head at the sound of muffled footsteps coming nearer, and Steve came into view holding two Styrofoam cups of what was probably the punch. Steve shifted both cups into one hand awkwardly and offered her a hand up, a small smile on his face, and that solved that problem.

"Thanks," she told him when she was on her feet. She turned to Eleanor and said "let me know if you need more pointers," because Steve was still standing there looking friendly and expectant, which meant this was the opener to a conversation and not a friendly help-up. He handed her a drink.

"I don't think we've spoken properly," Steve said, and did not add that this was because their first and only conversation had consisted of Loki explaining that if a hot dog was not literally encased in plastic it was not a _proper_ hot dog and did not belong at a barbecue. That had been fun. She hadn't expected him to _apologize_. Or bring proper hot dogs this time.

Really, it was like he was trying to get her to like him.

She dialed down the smile and held out her hand. "Nikole Garcia." Behind Steve's shoulder, Andrea and Sam had been joined by a woman wearing an emerald dress just slightly too fancy for a neighborhood barbecue and pulling off the look. Andrea had that half smile on her face that meant she was aware she was supposed to be smiling right now but couldn't quite muster up some convincing interest, and her stance was wide; challenging. Now, _that_ was interesting.

Loki divided her attention between Steve, who wanted very much for them to get off on the right foot this time, and between the budding maybe-fight between Andrea and green dress. " _Why'd you get discharged?_ " drifted up from the conversation, followed by " _punched out my CO_ ". It was a very good story, from what Loki remembered. Shame it came with too many bad memories for Andrea to really enjoy it.

"So," Steve said, "How's your garden? I saw you were hard at work in it last weekend."

"No, you saw Eleanor hard at work while I sat in the grass and looked stunning." It wasn't child labor if you paid them in sweets and lemonade. Anyway, kids liked getting their hands dirty.

Steve laughed politely. "You planted at _least_ one flower."

"Wow," Loki deadpanned. "Were you staring at us the whole time, or—?" She trailed off expectantly, because really. That was, what, fifteen minutes of work? It had been exhausting. From green dress over in Andrea's conversation, she heard " _Not as nice for the Kremlin,_ " and a low chuckle.

Steve had gone a bit red, meanwhile, and was very clearly trying to come up with a response. Loki supposed he'd been doing the thing where you pretend that the person you're talking to accomplished more than they actually did as a means of ingratiating yourself to them and because small talk conversations had a minimum quota of compliments or something. Heimdall had told her once that she'd probably have an easier time of it here if she played along occasionally.

She broke a bit of Styrofoam off the rim of her cup absently. "You don't have to try so hard," she told him. Nicely, she thought.

Andrea's voice had gotten quieter, so that Loki couldn't make out words anymore. She glanced over at the group, and this time Andrea caught her eye. Andrea widened her eyes and jerked her head slightly to indicate she wanted Loki over there. She looked… decidedly stressed, which happened to her more than it tended to happen to Loki. Andrea _hated_ being off-balance in a crowd. Loki turned her attention back to Steve and gave him a smile, and a subtle nudge over towards Andrea.

"Why don't we join your husband over there?" Okay, so subtlety maybe wasn't her strong suit.

Still, Steve went easily enough, possibly hoping that the addition of other people would improve the conversation. It was cute that he tried, really, and unfortunate that Loki was heading over there to play 'rescue Andrea from the civilians'. She did that by directing their attention toward her, and there were only so many ways she knew how to do that. Andrea gave her a bright smile when she arrived. She positioned herself directly across from Andrea and green dress, with Steve trailing up to stand on her left, and Sam giving Steve a rueful look from her right.

"Sam," Andrea said, "I'm not sure if you've met my wife, Nikole. Nikole, this is Sam Rogers, Steve's husband." Loki figured it was about 50/50 whether Andrea had intentionally left green dress out of that.

Green dress had clearly noticed the slight. She turned an assessing gaze on Loki that put Loki in mind of someone sizing her up on the other side of a fight. Loki flashed her a brilliant smile that widened when the other woman's eyes narrowed. "And who are you?"

"Right, um," Steve said when the woman kept staring. "This is Natasha. She's our, uh—"

"Girlfriend," Natasha supplied curtly when he hesitated.

"Yes, that." Steve smiled at her, and Loki flicked her eyes between the two of them and over to Sam, noting the 'our'.

 _"_ _Really,_ " she said. "That is _fantastic_. You might beat out me and Andrea for 'most gossiped about relationship', thanks."

From her left came the sound of Sam trying very hard to bite back a laugh. She glanced at Steve to find him smiling as well, but Natasha evidently had no sense of humor at all. Natasha took a drink from her cup, and then said. "And what do you do, Nikole?" The name came out as if she found it somewhat distasteful to say. Loki was starting to get the feeling that conversation she'd been overhearing between her and Steve had been about them.

"I'm an accountant," she told her, with every innocent microexpression she could muster.

From the way her eyebrows rose, she didn't believe her, which didn't surprise Loki. Probably she'd asked around the neighborhood already. She seemed the recon type. Natasha made a show of looking Loki over from head to toe and apparently being unimpressed with what she saw.

"Bullshit."

" _Nat,_ " Sam said, voice strained, like they had talked about this before.

"No, please, it's fine," Loki's grin hadn't wavered. She pretended not to notice when Andrea took a small step back, away from the conversation, as soon as the other three's attention was fixed on Loki. She continued, amiably, because Natasha clearly wanted a fight and because Andrea clearly didn't like her. "I get that _all_ the time. People say: but how can you be so pretty and still like math? But I can understand how you might expect someone much more intimidating or stereotypically villainous. It's a natural expectation for someone with the power to get you in trouble. It can be so difficult shuffling those numbers around in a way that can't be tracked, can't it? Once bitten..."

Oh, she'd made Natasha angry with that. Oops. How careless of her. "Are you fucking serious?"

Loki raised her eyebrows. "Oh, I'm sorry. Did you purchase that dress through _other_ means?"

"Hey, uh, maybe don't—" Sam looked more than a little lost, but whatever he was about to say was drowned out by Natasha.

"I purchased it with the money I earned, _legally,_ by doing my job. And given my boss is Tony _fucking_ Stark, I'd say I earned it. It's a nice feeling. You're probably not familiar."

 _If you want the right to live on your own, Loki, you have to earn it._ Fuck. Something unexpectedly cold and vicious threaded through Loki, and she grabbed hold of it and tried to fight it back under control because, fuck, this wasn't supposed to get personal. Not for _her_ at least. She was Nikole here and this was home base, and she _was_ careful, in some ways.

"I've earned plenty," she said, but it was as much to herself as to Natasha.

"Okay, that's enough." Steve was glaring at Natasha now. "Natasha, you promised you weren't going to do this."

Natasha rolled her eyes. "Right. Friendly barbecue. Friendly neighbors." She gave an obviously fake smile.

Steve frowned at her, and then glanced at Loki and Andrea. "We're going to be neighbors for a while," he said. "All I want is for us to get along," and this seemed to be directed primarily at Loki. She crumbled a bit more of her cup into the now-empty bottom and feigned nonchalance instead of addressing that.

"Right," she said. "I was promised hot dogs?"

"Yes," Steve said, clearly relieved. "They should be done by now. Oh, and actually, while I was picking them up I found some of those little personal ice cream cups, for dessert! I got vanilla; I figured that was the safest option." He hurried away. Natasha and Sam trailed after him, Sam offering a weak smile to Andrea as he went.

Andrea stepped forward and took Steve's place beside Loki. "I think that went well," she said.

 **⁂**

America sprawled on their living room couch that night, a narrow glass bowl of tiramisu balanced carefully on her lap and one hand carding absently through Nikole's hair. On the television, young Isabella knelt over her baby sister's still form, wracked with tearless sobs.

" _Oh_ ," Nikole breathed. America glanced down to where she knelt on a battered pillow, her head positioned at exactly the most convenient spot for America to reach. She'd foregone silverware, as always, and as she watched the accidental sorocide's aftermath raptly, eyes glistening, the tiramisu she'd scooped up with her fingers just as the killing blow was struck fell directly onto the rug. Nikole glanced down at it idly, and instead of moving to clean it up, she stuck her fingers in her mouth and turned back to the TV.

"That's going to stain if you leave it," America pointed out.

"Probably," Nikole agreed absently, and scooped up more tiramisu from her bowl. "Oh, no, Bella, what are you _doing_?" Isabella's stepfather had come to investigate the commotion, but his daughter's body was out of his view from the doorway, and Isabella gave a hasty explanation about the cat knocking over a vase.

America wasn't sure how much Nikole really _liked_ this show; she seemed to get into it well enough, and had plenty of strong opinions about the characters' progressively worse life choices, but Nikole had strong opinions on everything, and she swapped emotions around so quickly and so completely, half the time America couldn't tell if they were real. It was entirely possible Nikole thought America liked this melodramatic disaster and was just playing along; it was something she'd do. It'd taken seven months of America putting on _Homogenic_ every time they were in the car together for her to admit she hated Björk.

She looked back down at the tiramisu slowly seeping into the white shag. Nikole couldn't really be planning to let that sit, not after she'd gone to all the trouble of decorating the house in the first place. America tugged sharply on her hair, and Nikole went with the motion, looking up at America with that little half-smirk like she was waiting for America to do something amusing.

" _What_?" she whined, dragging out the word like she'd never been so put-upon in her life.

America stared pointedly at the mess.

Nikole _hmm_ ed. "I'm comfy," she said, and then to make her point she settled more firmly against the couch, eyes slipping shut. America tried—she really did—to be irritated, but she'd always thought Nikole was adorable when she got like this, and anyway, _she_ was the one who was going to regret it when the fancy rug was stained tomorrow, not America.

The sound of a phone ringing cut cleanly through the mood. Nikole jerked upright, looking over to where her phones sat on the side table. The fact that it _rang_ at all meant it was her work phone, which had distinct ringtones for a number of unspecified persons, and which she _always_ answered. America sat back as Nikole pulled herself to her feet and plucked the phone off the table. She swiped across the screen with one hand to accept the call, and brushed her hair back with the other, already miles away from this room and America and Isabella onscreen as she tried to maneuver her sister's body so it looked like she took a spill down the stairs.

Nikole didn't speak; she held the phone to her ear for less than a minute before irritably flipping it shut and glancing around the room, presumably for her shirt and bra. "I've gotta go for a bit," she said.

America watched her face, but it had gone blank and hard, and America still couldn't read her like that. She might have been annoyed. America leaned forward and grabbed Nikole's bowl, stacking it on top of her own. "I hate your last-minute clients," she said. It might have been uncharitable, but it was Sunday night and it wasn't like Nikole was happy about it either.

Nikole slid her a glance and paused a moment before replying. "That's the downside to freelancing," she said. Her lips quirked like she was sharing a joke. "Anyway, it's noon tomorrow in Tokyo, so we need to get this little issue under control immediately. What they could tell me over the phone sounded very serious."

Right, her freelance work with major international accounting firms. Because that joke had been funny after the first time. "Fucking _hell_ , Nikole, we're really doing this?"

Nikole blinked at her, wide-eyed. "Doing what?"

America opened her mouth, and then stopped. They needed to have this conversation for real, but fuck if she knew what to say, and this was definitely not the time. How were you supposed to make your partner understand that it terrified you when she treated her safety like a joke? Especially when it wasn't like America's real job was _safer_. It wasn't that she wanted her to stop, just. Acknowledge there was a risk there. "Just," she sighed, "be careful, all right?"

Nikole paused with her shirt halfway on, and then pulled it the rest of the way on and looked straight at America. "You know I'm always careful," she said, which was a fucking lie. "I'll be back later. Tell me how the episode ends."

⁂

Andrea worried too much, Loki thought. It had gotten especially bad ever since Loki had come home one day a couple weeks after they'd moved in together with three broken fingers and an ugly, but shallow, gash down her neck (her own fault, for not screening a new contact as well as she should have — that had been a messy night); one little mistake and now Andrea was all _be careful, Nikole_ , like Loki needed the reminder. She didn't laugh at the accountant joke anymore, either. It made Loki nervous.

 _Who's worrying too much now?_ Loki shook it off. Andrea wasn't her mother; she'd tell her if something was really wrong, probably.

She carefully avoided the colorful array of newly-planted flowers lining the sidewalk. She was confident Susanna wouldn't be able to top their front garden this summer, assuming nobody ran over the flowerbed again; a solid 40-60 chance, given Andrea's parking skills. Maneuvering around the muddy Subaru, Loki slipped into the driver's side of her own car, a nondescript silver two-door that wasn't so flashy it stood out in regular company, but nice enough to pass with richer crowds. It was a gift from her mother, and as such came equipped with a state-of-the-art GPS tracking system, but Loki didn't mind too much. There was always Andrea's car, if Loki needed to go anywhere she didn't want her mother's security team asking questions about.

Loki drove a circuitous route loosely eastward at precisely the speed limit, matching up streets to turn on to whatever top-forties song happened to be on. When she hit the freeway, her personal phone buzzed once in the passenger seat, and then again two minutes later. Eventually she pulled onto a long, narrow road lined with ornate lamp posts Loki knew disguised what could only be described as an honestly _paranoid_ number of security cameras. It meandered through immense, beautifully-tended gardens and apple orchards before finally terminating at a gatehouse which opened to a wide plaza.

Loki pulled up to the guard's station, slipping her phone into her purse and getting out of the car, leaving it on idle.

"Ma'am." She couldn't tell from the guard's tone if he was happy, angry, or horrified to see her.

"Hey, Heimdall," Loki grinned. "How's the kid? I practically never see him, you know. How's he like that knife I got him?"

The man's face didn't so much as _twitch_ , which was unfortunate, if expected. He was too much of a professional these days to get a real rise out of. "Are you expected?"

"Heimdall," she sighed, "I'm _hurt_. I come all the way out here in the dead of night to annoy you, and you think I have _ulterior motives_? Well. I might say hello to your wife. I know I don't have to ask if _she_ likes my taste in knives." She patted him on the shoulder, slinging the strap of her purse over her own as she did, and headed off across the plaza before her composure broke and she gave in to the impulse to rib him for that tiny, brief quirk of his lips that probably constituted a smile. She could be a professional, too, when she tried. Anyway, Heimdall knew full well she was expected, and one of his lackeys would move the car for her.

At the center of the plaza was a fountain depicting two huge marble cats swatting playfully at the Earth like a ball of yarn, and past that was the manor's entrance, huge courthouse pillars and massive double doors. Two more blank-faced men in suits opened the doors for her in silence. They were also expecting her, and the long, camera-lined road gave them ample time to get into position. Everything, for the Allmother, was about appearances, most importantly the appearance of omniscience.

The grand foyer's curving staircase had chandelier sconces running up its panelled walls, and more heavy double doors at either end of the hall led to public rooms: reception and state rooms, and the showier, vintage office the Allmother used for her serious business deals, with its glass-cased collection of liquor, mahogany, studded leather, and an Underwood No. 5 in perfect working order. She loved the good old days of speakeasies and larger-than-life mobsters: 'when organized crime had flair', she said.

Half-hidden in an alcove beneath the staircase was a less ostentatious door, which led to the private living spaces in the manor. Here, the halls were narrower ( _confining_ ), the doors came one at a time, and while everything was still immaculate, there were touches that suggested someone might actually _live_ here: a box of tissues sitting on top of a small curio display cabinet, through an open door a personal library with as many paperbacks with cracked spines as priceless first editions, the occasional family photo hung on the walls. Loki avoided the help as she navigated the maze of dimly lit corridors, ignoring another buzz from her phone as she slipped down a short flight of stairs. Anything the Allmother _really_ wanted kept safe was in this recessed wing of the manor, with its reinforced concrete walls and electronic locks on every door. There were cameras in every hall and room of the manor, but in this wing, they weren't even hidden. A security camera glared at Loki as she waited in front of a door that looked no different from any of the others, and then the locks disengaged.

Loki stepped into the antechamber of her mother's personal office, smoothed down her skirt, and then entered the room.

While this office wasn't the one the Allmother met with her business partners in, it was barely less ostentatious. The biggest difference was the computer on her mahogany desk. The Allmother lounged comfortably in one of two oversized armchairs beside a fireplace (electric, for the sake of security) on one side of the large room which served as a sitting area. She perused a leatherbound folio, a cocktail on the table at her right hand.

Loki sunk to a kneel several feet from the foot of her chair. "Mother."

The Allmother regarded her coolly. "Loki," she acknowledged after several seconds, with a slight nod signalling that Loki could stand. She closed the folio and placed it on the table beside her. "How familiar are you with Bishop Industries?"

Business, then. That was for the best: she had never been particularly good at the _polite_ part of polite small talk, and she'd outgrown the age where her mother found that endearing. She thought for a second. "Multinational publishing and distribution company. They specialize in the import and export of high risk goods, often with embargoed countries." Right up her mother's alley, in other words.

"Very good," the Allmother said, in the same tone she'd used when Loki was first studying the family alliances as a child. Loki felt very much like a dog that had just done a mediocre trick, and she ruthlessly shoved down a flicker of self-consciousness. She couldn't afford to be off her game, not in front of her mother. She clasped her hands behind her back in a move that she was pretty sure looked casual, and avoided glancing at the second armchair. It was only there because one armchair didn't quite look the same — as far as Loki knew nobody had ever sat in it. "I've sponsored them for almost two decades now, to both our benefit, but it seems as though one of their board members has decided to branch out _independently_." Her voice curled around that last word the same way it had the last two years now. "The CEO is holding a fundraising gala at his estate the day after tomorrow. You'll be attending."

"Why?"

"Because I _asked_ you to, Loki." Like she was being incredibly indulgent putting up with that kind of question. "You'll have to make your own arrangements getting an invitation. Obviously, attending on behalf of Asgardia isn't an option." One of the downsides to working this close to home was that she was Nikole Garcia here, and people actually _recognized_ her. She was a memorable person. Anyway, nobody who knew what Asgardia was would talk openly with anyone connected to it. That was a good way to find yourself bankrupt. Or dead.

"Oh, sure! While I'm getting on a closed and highly vetted guest list the day before the gala, is there anything else you need? A magic cloak that lets you fly, perhaps?"

" _Loki_ ," her mother said sharply, and Loki backtracked.

"I apologize. It will be done." Somehow.

The Allmother looked at her silently for a moment, then continued. "You're resourceful, I'm sure you'll figure something out. I'm assuming you'll be using that cover you like so much, the escort?"

Loki froze, her half-formed reply vanishing from her head. The Allmother had never singled out one of her covers like that for no reason before, and for a terrifying moment Loki wondered if she knew about the actual clients she'd been picking up as Nikole, to keep some cash on hand in case things went bad, and she couldn't piece them back together like she had two years ago. She thought back, trying to remember if she'd been careless recently, if she'd met up with anyone the Allmother might have investigated.

Or she was just being paranoid. Bishop—and his parties—had a reputation. A sex worker would be far from out of place.

The Allmother must have taken her silence as assent, because she continued. "Well enough, anyway. No one would believe you're being kept around for your _personality_."

 _What a loving mother_. The thought was in Andrea's voice. She smiled tightly. "Right. And when I have a name?"

"Bishop needs to be reminded that I will not be toyed with. I'd like you to arrange for our little entrepreneur to meet Scarlip."

"Yes, ma'am." Loki didn't react at the feel of her phone buzzing twice in quick succession in her pocket. "Is there a deadline on this?" she asked. At best, she'd have a couple leads on the guy by the end of the gala. If the Allmother expected her to figure out who he was, _conclusively_ , kill him, and wrap up any loose ends all in the space of a night, she was going to _scream_.

"No more than the timeliness I have always expected from you."

Well, thank fuck for that. Loki inclined her head respectfully, mind turning to how she was going to get herself into this party, and started to leave.

"Stay," the Allmother said, stopping her in her tracks. "Keep your dear mother company tonight. I hardly see you nowadays." She closed her files and picked up her glass with an air of finality.

Her mother been doing this more often lately. Since Loki'd moved in with Andrea, maybe. No — since she'd had that fight with her mother just before. After her mother had taken her apartment away and shut her out from renting, and she hadn't come running back. It had been two years and Loki was still waiting for some kind of punishment, and that honestly terrified her, a little bit.

The Allmother stood and brushed by her. Loki thought about the texts she still hadn't answered, or read, and unhappily followed. _Sorry, Andrea._

⁂

 **Andrea** : Heading to ur mom's or work?  
 **Yesterday** 11:56 PM  
 **Andrea** : Are u coming home tonight?  
 **Andrea** : Sorry I snapped u earlier  
 **Andrea** : Stay safe  
 **Today** 3:12 AM  
 **Loki** : back in the morning

⁂

 **Today** 3:12 AM  
 **Loki** : hey v u up  
 **Verity** : Yeah.  
 **Loki** : cool i need a favor  
 **Verity** : Rates haven't changed. Shoot.  
 **Loki** : so lol u know that party happening in the bishop mansion  
 **Loki** : like...tomorrow night  
 **Verity** : Oh no.  
 **Verity** : I've changed my mind, my rates have changed.  
 **Verity** : They've tripled.  
 **Verity** : Rising cost of business, yknow.  
 **Verity** : Miracles don't come cheap these days.  
 **Loki** : cmon v i wouldnt ask so last minute if i had a choice  
 **Loki** : ur my only hope  
 **Loki** : next best is this asshole w no boundaries i cut off 4mos ago  
 **Loki** : u wouldnt make me do that v i know u wouldnt  
 **Verity** : You're so lucky I like you.  
 **Verity** : Does the alias matter?  
 **Loki** : gotta be nikole  
 **Loki** : if bishops hiring thatd be great but given circumstances im willing 2 deal  
 **Verity** : Got it. I'll see what I can do.  
 **Loki** : tysm ur a gift  
 **Verity** : Yeah, yeah, I know.  
 **Verity** : But this isn't.  
 **Verity** : I'm not kidding about the fee.  
 **Loki** : didnt think u were  
 **Loki** : 3x  
 **Loki** : i got it

⁂

There was a sword on America's desk. It definitely hadn't been there yesterday, the blade of the uchigatana gleaming under the fluorescents where it sat on top the piled boxes of various ammunition that had taken over her workstation. The whole back office, really, was kind of a disaster: there were metal cabinets along the walls, full of weapons Xavin kept meticulously organized. Six years ago, those were enough to hold everyone's supplies, but Teddy was a _waste not, want not_ kind of guy, and kept every gun he ever took off somebody. Now, the whole place was piles of heavy artillery and paperwork, grimy and post-apocalyptic with an oil stench sunk deep into the walls. Someone had tied a couple cheap car air fresheners to the front of the oscillating fan in the corner, but all that did was make it smell like someone had spilled a bottle of lemon juice in a dirty garage.

The only clear table in the back room was one in a little nook by the fan, across from the heavy set of steel doors that lead to the facade of a front office. Two surge protectors duct-taped to the wall held everyone's phone chargers and the plug to the coffee maker (which sat on the table), minifridge (which sat on the floor beside the table), and water cooler (which sat on the minifridge). Officially, it was the "communal lunch room", but the bosses never stayed in the office for lunch, and America, Xavin, and Teddy all used it to do paperwork. Even when they managed to clear enough space on their desks to work, it just got buried again within the hour. But nobody put shit on the lunch table; that might block the coffee maker.

America tapped her pen on the wooden tabletop as she flipped through the objectives and parameters of her newly assigned mission. The photos were all grainy, black-and-white affairs; the guy was either paranoid enough or technology-shy enough to use the fax machine in this, the year of our Lord twenty-seventeen, and America could tell this was gonna be a pain in the ass even before she got to the date that had been circled in thick marker.

She sighed and dialed her phone one-handed.

"You can just dump the corpse in the East River, it won't turn up for a couple months," Nikole said as soon as she answered. "You shouldn't need my help to hide a body, _really_." America scoffed, but quietly, so Nikole couldn't hear. The day she needed Nikole's help to hide a body was the day she retired.

"Have you slept yet?" America asked. She hadn't been home yet when America left for work. Teddy, sitting across from America with a brown paper lunch bag he'd just started opening, paused and propped his chin on the palm of his left hand. Three of his fingers were missing to the first joint in what had hilariously been a freak accident with a lawnmower instead of a fight. It had taken a week for him to admit what had actually happened, which was probably smart, because that had been three years ago and he'd yet to live it down. He raised his eyebrows and gave America's phone a significant look. _Mind your own goddamn business,_ she mouthed at him.

"Nope," Nikole said brightly. She got like that, sometimes, when she was really tired or really stressed. Like she didn't know how to be sincere, but didn't have the energy to put up a real act, so she feigned an obnoxious degree of cheerfulness instead. It was possibly America's least favorite version of her wife. "Thank fuck for coffee, huh?"

Meanwhile, Teddy grinned. _I mean it, Theodore. This isn't a free show._ "Caffeine isn't actually a replacement for sleep, you know that, right?" A _hmph_ on the other end of the line. "Anyway, uh. You know that dinner thing tomorrow night?" Nikole had acquired a reservation at some fancy French restaurant she'd never been to before, the kind that didn't even bother putting prices on the menu because if you cared, you obviously couldn't afford it. She'd been insufferably proud of herself for months—she'd gotten the reservation without using her mother's influence—and while America would never admit it, she'd been kind of looking forward to it too.

There was a pause on the other end. "Yeah, about that," and it was _not_ the tone America had been expecting. "A thing came up last minute," said Nikole. "Charity fundraiser with a bunch of rich people, or whatever. A friend of mine came down with something and asked me to fill in."

"Oh. Are they okay?"

"Eh." America could _hear_ the little handwave as she said it. "Apparently it's either the flu, HIV, the black plague, or maybe a bad case of food poisoning. It wasn't really clear."

"WebMD?"

"Don't you know it. Anyway, that table was hell to get, so if you still wanna go, you could take what's-his-name, the VA guy and his boyfriend."

"Husband."

"Whatever," Nikole said. "Just don't let them bring that straight chick along. We have _standards_."

Funny how life worked, sometimes. "Actually, I was calling to let you know I won't be able to make it." She looked down at the papers; a narcotics officer based out of Xoroq who had mysteriously come into a large sum of money since taking the job was having a small crystal figurine shipped to his mansion that weekend. A small figurine worth a shit-ton of money, apparently, that their client wanted for 'sentimental reasons'. "Got pulled for this job babysitting some no-name rock star in Las Vegas. I'm getting shipped out first thing tomorrow morning."

"Ooh, Vegas. Sounds exciting. You should take pictures."

"You've _seen_ Vegas."

"Barely," said Nikole. "I was very distracted, after all. Anyway, I'll bring back pizza tonight. Sausage, right?"

Nikole hung up before America could answer, and that just left her with Teddy fuckin' Altman and the expectant look on his pretty little white boy face.

Mercenaries weren't known for their EQ: you didn't have to know how somebody was feeling to shoot them. Generally, not knowing made the job easier. And the people who _were_ good at all that shit, who could tell if you were having relationship issues or didn't like your boss at a glance, well. If they were still in this field of work they were probably a fucking psychopath.

But then there was Teddy Altman. America wasn't sure if he was a real human, honestly. He may in fact have appeared fully formed from a bowl of ingredients like a powerpuff girl. He had a marriage that came straight out of a hallmark card; suggested shit like AA meetings and smoking cessation studies and couple's therapy. He legitimately seemed to _care_ about everyone, even as he was both disgustingly, almost unnervingly emotionally perceptive and one of the most lethal people America had ever met. And as far as America knew, he did all that without a single fucking nightmare about, like, kids, or sad dying eyes, or anything.

"Seems like that didn't go too bad," he said mildly.

"What didn't?" Xavin asked, coming through the doors that separated reception and the bosses' offices from the back room. A wave of Xavin's wrist over the access panel and the LED flashed over from green to red as the alarm reactivated and the deadbolts locked into place. "Oh. Your argument was resolved?"

Of _course_ they'd been talking.

The pin on the front of Xavin's ironed purple button-down read "SHE/HER" today. Her fondness for button-downs had her assigned to the reception desk more often than not. She was tall, muscular, and professional, with a close-shaved haircut and a faint frown for a resting expression; she _looked_ like a bodyguard, a hell of a lot more convincingly than the rest of them, which was useful for convincing the occasional drop-in that the bodyguard service this building officially hosted definitely 100% actually existed.

"There wasn't an argument," America said, as Xavin reached around Teddy to start the coffee maker. "Seriously. It's fine. It's just, you know. The same old shit." Sometimes America wondered where they'd be if she'd said no two years ago, when Darcy had leaned over her desk and told her she needed to solidify her cover ("I mean, don't get me wrong, the marriage looks great on _paper_ , but it falls apart if anybody looks deeper."). The marriage hadn't even been _for_ a fucking cover, but this job had a way of wrapping itself around everything that happened in her life. A marriage was a paper trail, and it was attached to her alias now, and damned if Darcy wasn't ready to pounce on that. If she'd put her foot down then, or if the _two fucking weeks_ she'd spent talking Nikole into moving in with her hadn't gone anywhere, maybe things would be better. They'd still be hanging out at each other's apartments more often than not, but they wouldn't be in each other's faces all the time. Maybe then Nikole wouldn't feel like she had to lie about things to have independence, and America wouldn't have to sit back and watch her pull shit that was gonna get her killed every single day.

"Have you tried talking about it?" Teddy said.

Xavin's chin wrinkled. "Uh- _huh,_ " she said in Teddy's direction. "How _are_ things going with Billy?"

The coffee maker running was the only sound for a solid few seconds. "I'm sorry," America said, "is there _drama_ in the Altman household?" Teddy's husband was this adorable nerd who wore scarves and won Nobel Prizes in chemical engineering and then turned around and burned white sage to cleanse their house of dark energies. They'd been together for ages, and the only big disagreement they'd ever had was over whether they were well-equipped enough to handle the responsibilities of rescuing a dog. _Four years ago_.

Teddy shot America a sullen look, and Xavin poured some black coffee into her faded old USMC[7] mug as soon as there was enough in the pot. She wrapped her fingers around the ceramic. "Billy found out that Teddy is not actually a bodyguard."

Oh. _Oh._ That wasn't the kind of domestic trouble that warranted teasing. The only part of this job Teddy had ever struggled over was needing to lie to his husband about it. Honesty was in their fucking _vows_.

(At least Billy knew Teddy's real name.)

"How did he take it?" America asked. It couldn't have been _that_ bad, not if he was here and reasonably himself. But he was staring down at the table now, looking so ashamed it made you want to be a better person, just, in general.

"It— okay, I guess. He didn't get mad, really. At first he just kind of looked _sad_ at me. Which was worse. And he told me he was sorry I didn't feel I could trust him with this information. And he was _right_. I mean, he told me all about that shit he got into with, um." He waved his hand in a way that meant 'it's classified'. "With stuff. Anyway, Karolina knows what we do and nobody's disappeared the two of you yet," he said to Xavin. "So… I told him everything, and I apologized, and I think we're gonna be okay. We're working through it."

"Wow," America said. "That's so reasonable and healthy of you. I'm kind of offended you're so good at this."

Teddy made a face. "I never should have let it got this far," he said. "I lied to him for _years._ I don't know how he can ever forgive that."

"Only he can know that," Xavin said, with the reasonableness of someone who'd met her wife on the battlefield and had never even had the chance to use a cover story. "But… he loves you. Not your cover. And people will forgive a lot for love."

America smiled and agreed, and tried to ignore the weight in her gutthat said _so what reason would Nikole have to forgive you?_

⁂

America peered out beyond her perch on a solid outcropping of rock almost directly above a narrow, winding mountain road. She hadn't had much time to scope out the ambush site and set up a reasonably workable plan, but, hey, at least she'd been given the route in advance. It was all rocks and no road signs, and if she hadn't been directed here, she might never have been able to find it.

She checked her watch. ETA at least six minutes from now, and there was no sign of them on the road. She considered her options, then shifted her binoculars to one hand and fished her phone out of her pocket. Worst case scenario, she'd have to scale back up the side of the mountain to get it, and she'd have to do that anyway to grab the rest of her supplies. She tapped a quick text to Nikole.

 **Today** 6:18 AM  
 **America** : Has ur party started yet?

The phone blinked an alert almost immediately.

 **Nikole** : met a rich heiress  
 **Nikole** : she wants 2 take me 2 Belize  
 **Nikole** : what are ur feelings on polygamy

One of these days Nikole was going to be dead serious about a story, and America was just not going to believe her. Which, for all she knew, was the point. This _was_ Nikole. America checked the road again, then texted back.

 **America** : Idk how rich?  
 **Nikole** : private jet  
 **America** : I'll start planning the wedding  
 **Nikole** :  
 **Nikole** : hows ur rock star

America lifted the binoculars to her eyes and stared at an uninterrupted stretch of mountain road, and grass, and rocks. She thought about coming up with an exciting answer. She wasn't quite _that_ bored yet.

 **America** : It's been pretty boring so far  
 **Nikole** : what are u gonna do if some1 stabs him while ur texting me

America snorted at the thought, but also checked the road again. That might actually be worse than Teddy's lawnmower incident, and like _hell_ was she going to set herself up for that kind of mockery.

 **America** : Wow that'd suck  
 **America** : He still owes me half my paycheck  
 **America** : U think I could talk his next of kin into doing posthumous payment?

A faint rumbling sound in the distance sounded before she got a reply. Jackpot? Better safe than sorry. She scooped up her phone and quickly typed out one more message before stowing it in a cargo pocket.

 **America** : Thing's happening, gtg

She jumped off her rock just as the van drove underneath her, landing heavily on the armored roof. Between the potholes literally lining the roadway and the reinforced (and thus… maybe sound-insulated?) body, she might even have landed without anyone knowing. She wasn't about to wait around to see if anyone came out to check, though. She carefully maneuvered over the back of the van until she was perched just over the driver's side window, and then she swung down just far enough to fire 5 shots through the window and watch the driver jerk in response. The van swerved dangerously, and America used the hilt of her gun to smash the window enough to reach in and unlock the door. She dragged the driver from the seat and swung in herself as fast as she could, grabbing the wheel and trying to move with the turn and brake _slowly_. The van shuddered as they clipped a large rock that, at highway speeds, would have done a hell of a lot more damage. Fuck.

There was a clatter as the door to the back of the van opened, and faint, angry exclamations. Round two was starting. She slipped a respirator mask over her face. Two gas canisters in a waist pocket went out the window. She waited for a count of 5, then opened the door and rolled out of the van, and _fuck_. No matter how many times you did it, no matter how perfect your form was, it still fucking _hurt_. Short of breath, she pushed back the pain of bruised ribs and a probably-sprained ankle to the back of her mind and got back on her feet, holding her gun ready.

One guard stumbled into view, coughing, one hand braced on the side of the van. He saw her and brought up an arm, but his hand was shaking and the shot went wide. America didn't give him a chance to try again — she shot forward and grabbed his arm, jabbing at a pressure point that made him drop the gun from suddenly-nerveless fingers. At this point, Xavin would probably have killed him with a fancy martial arts move. America yanked him close, placed her gun at the base of his head, and fired.

She turned so that the guard's body was between her and the corner of the van, but there was no movement she could see through the gas. Too much to hope the other guard had fainted or something. She adjusted her grip on the dead body until the feet hung just far enough above the ground they weren't audibly dragging, and maneuvered herself right against the corner of the van. She shoved the body around the corner and followed it a second later, firing. Trigger-happy guard in this gas took the bait, and the body jerked as it was riddled with bullets on the way to the ground. This left America free to drop the guard with a bullet each to the shoulder and upper chest. She walked up to the body, considered it, and then added two more bullets to the chest.

She dragged the body off of the van and dropped it next to the first one, then looked around. The scene was eerily quiet after the brief firefight, and an ominous grey through the still-dispersing smoke. The mission briefing had said two guards and a driver, but the mission briefing had been wrong before. She did another circuit of the van to make sure, and then she followed the messy tire treads back towards the road to find the driver. She was on elbows and knees, slowly crawling away. Lucky asshole.

America raised her gun, but the driver looked back and spotted her. The driver raised her arms, wincing when that jarred her obviously shot-up shoulder.

"I'm not paid enough for this, man," she said. "Take whatever you want."

America thought about it. She was wearing a mask, and a cap that had most of her hair shoved inside it. There wasn't a whole lot of danger as far as her identity went. And she didn't really like shooting people who had their hands up. Felt mean, somehow, the way a firefight didn't.

She shrugged. "It's your lucky day," she told the driver. She kept her gun handy as she patted the driver down for weapons, finding a knife in a boot and nothing else. She gestured with her gun back toward the van. "You're gonna stay with me, though."

It was fucking slow, because the driver's balance was obviously shot, but by the time they got to the van's back doors the gas was pretty much gone, so there was that, at least. She fished a pair of zip-ties out of a pocket and tossed them at the driver, telling her to tie herself to the door, and then hoisted herself into the van.

There was a small lamp by the door, and the light revealed piles and piles of unmarked, brown boxes. The figurine was six fucking inches high. She turned to the driver. "Do you know where anything is in here?"

The driver shrugged. "I just drive the van. Sorry."

Fucking hell. She was going to be here for an hour, at least. She holstered her gun and pulled out her phone again. Nikole hadn't texted, but she wouldn't have. She treated 'gtg' when America was at work like a call to radio silence, and America appreciated that.

 **Today** 6:49 AM  
 **America** : My life is hell  
 **America** : Pls tell me something interesting is happening there

The phone buzzed as she was opening the first box and peering skeptically at the piles of packing Styrofoam balls. It kept buzzing, for a while. America stared at it, but that wasn't going to magically tell her what had Nikole so incredibly excited. She swiped the phone open to a series of texts.

 **Nikole** : well i was looking at cat pics  
 **Nikole** : and then the guy throwing the party came over and chewed me out  
 **Nikole** : for "not engaging w the guests" lmao  
 **Nikole** : his daughter had to rescue me  
 **Nikole** : shes an fbi agent  
 **Nikole** : and her wife is her partner  
 **Nikole** : wife AND fbi partner  
 **Nikole** : for real  
 **Nikole** : double threat partners  
 **Nikole** : im inviting them to dinner  
 **Nikole** : will u be home by sunday

No. Oh, _fuck_ no. This was not the kind of excitement America could support. This was not excitement she needed in her life.

 **America** : Omfg Nikole u can't just invite FBI agents to dinner  
 **Nikole** : why not

 _Why not_ —? This was it. This, right here, this was how America Chavez, lesbian mercenary extraordinaire, was going to die. If she didn't drop dead from stress right here in this fucking van in the ass-end of Tajikistan, it'd be in a 6x9' concrete cell 20 years and a half-dozen suicide attempts from now.

She'd tried the prison thing. It hadn't agreed with her.

 **America** : Ur job is ILLEGAL  
 **Nikole** : im an accountant andrea  
 **Nikole** : thats not illegal :P

" _Fucking_ —!" America kicked a box. This, because her day was apparently just not going badly enough yet, set the two boxes stacked perilously on top of it off balance, the lower of the two slipping sideways with a loud, glassy crash as the one on top, of _course_ , set a crash-course for her head. America dropped her phone and a fistful of brown wrapping paper and braced herself to catch it.

On the floor of the van, her phone buzzed again.

"Are you all right?" said the zip-tied woman, though she didn't seem to care much.

" _I'm fine,_ " America said tightly as she maneuvered the box to an empty bit of floor. Its contents _clunk_ ed unhappily. She scooped her phone back up.

 **Nikole** : its not like i work 4 the mob

America took a slow, measured breath. "Hey, zip-tie lady," she said. "Hypothetically, say your wife invited a couple FBI agents over to dinner this weekend. Like, at your house. That's fucked, right?"

The zip-tied woman blinked several times, and whether it was because of Nikole or the traumatic brain injury was unclear. "That sounds… bad," she said finally.

America tapped back a response.

 **America** : Don't fucking start this Nikole I'm serious

"It's definitely not _good_!" America sat her phone on a box and began angrily sifting through another. "She should know better than this! I mean, holy shit, what kind of fucking dumbass meets a couple LEOs on the job and thinks 'I should invite them over to my house for dinner'?"

"You have a complicated problem," the zip-tied woman said, with the emotional distance of a badly concussed captive forced to be an impromptu marriage counselor. "Also, a very talkative wife." She nodded toward the phone.

 **Nikole** : so am i  
 **Nikole** : i literally dont work 4 the mob  
 **Nikole** : why should they care  
 **Nikole** : u dont gotta freak out about this its nbd

America choked back a laugh. "She says it's no big deal. No big deal, my fucking _ass_. It's always the same shit with her," she said, and adopted a mildly unkind impression of her wife's accent and register. "'Don't freak out, but I might have HIV', 'don't freak out, but my mom got me evicted', 'don't freak out, but I'm inviting the _fucking_ FBI over!'"

 _Don't freak out, but. But. But._ And it wasn't like America never came home with her own injuries. But when America came home with a knife wound in her arm it was a _fucking knife wound_ , and she didn't think it was too much to ask to be allowed to _acknowledge_ when her wife came home with bruises down the entire left side of her body and a fucking concussion. Half the time Nikole wouldn't even tell her she'd been hurt, if she thought she could get away with it, and when she couldn't, it was _"don't freak out, but when you get off work can you swing by the ER?"_ like getting fucking _shot_ was just another minor inconvenience. To this day she _still_ didn't know if she could even take the nurse's confusion at why they'd do a rape kit as confirmation of anything.

She started sifting through another box. "All I want is for her to just, for _once_ , recognize that her actions have real-life consequences! Like prison! I don't care how rich her family is, she's not some kind of— of fucking _god_ above all reproach. And her mother despises me, so _I'm_ definitely not. I don't need feds crawling all over my house!"

The zip-tied woman nodded. "You should tell her this. Even if she can afford it, she should be thinking of you as well. That kind of selfishness has no place in a marriage."

 **America** : It's a bad fucking idea  
 **America** : Rich dude agrees with me

"Well," America said midway through the second text, "technically speaking, she doesn't. Know, I mean." The zip-tied woman looked at her quizzically. "That I'm a mercenary."

The zip-tied woman's confused stare was broken by a sudden groan as she closed her eyes, bringing her hands to her face and digging the knuckle of a thumb into the inside edge of her eye socket. She hissed in pain. Several seconds later, she said "Why does she not know this? Is that not important?"

"I," said America. "Well, she met me undercover." Which could have been temporary, except. "She kind of _is_ a cover? It's complicated."

Her phone buzzed, and then buzzed again. The zip-tied woman was looking at her judgmentally, so America swiped open the phone. She'd rather get angry at Nikole than feel _guilty_ about something she hardly could have helped in the first place.

 **Nikole** : omg andrea  
 **Nikole** : why r u recruiting random strangers into our argument  
 **Nikole** : fbi agent thinks its a great idea btw

Oh, so _that's_ how they were playing this? Of course the fucking FBI agent thought it was a great idea.

"That is…" the zip-tied woman seemed to be having great difficulty wrapping her head around this, which was understandable. America didn't like to think too hard about it either. "Does she even know your real name?"

"Well. Not exactly." Honestly, that was the part of this Nikole was least likely to give a shit about. A name was a name, and if anyone was going to understand _that_ , it'd be her. But the thing about it was, Andrea was an alias. Andrea was part of the _job_. And Nikole deserved better than that.

"So you are lying to her," the zip-tied woman said matter-of-factly, "and using her." America made a face and cut open another box. It wasn't _incorrect_ , just… simplistic. "Then you are angry because she makes a decision she cannot know hurts you. This relationship of yours does not sound healthy."

"I didn't _mean_ to—" America had not planned on getting into a conversation about the ethics of her marriage with a stranger, especially when she wasn't even sure she could defend it. She shook her head. Why did this keep coming _up_ all of a sudden? Three years, everything was fine, or as fine as it could be, and now— "That's not the point! So what if she doesn't know everything? She still shouldn't be inviting the FBI over! _Her_ job's illegal too!" Oh, speaking of.

 **America** : Does the FBI agent know ur a prostitute?

She probably should have felt shitty about that, but right now she was mostly just pissed, and she wanted to hurt Nikole, just a little bit _(_ " _that's a goddamn slur, and if I hear it come out of your mouth again, I'll fucking cut you")._ She hefted the box she'd just finished looking through and tossed it on the floor behind her with more force than was strictly necessary, and started going through the one beneath it. She must have gotten through half the van by now, and no sign of this fucking figurine.

"You are shifting blame," the zip-tied woman said. In her pocket, America's phone started up a series of rapid, angry buzzes. "Or, no, the other one. The goalposts. Maybe both," she added. "I drive. I do not give people therapy."

"You going somewhere with this?"

"You married this girl. I do not care why you did. It is still a sacred act." Oh, sure. A Vegas marriage, officiated at two in the morning by a tripped-out guy in costume Jedi robes. So sacred. Nikole's eyes had glinted in amusement as she recited her vows, some shit about standing alongside America against the forces of darkness and following her through whatever she faced. America wasn't precisely expecting follow-through. "You owe your wife your devotion, your faithfulness. How can you give these things to her when you have not even given her yourself?" Ouch. "A marriage cannot be based on lies! You disrespect her, you disrespect your marriage, and you disrespect Allah, _subhanahu wa ta'ala_. Do not play the victim when it is your own fault that you find yourself in this situation, and if she is not blameless it is also not your place to judge her! Tell her the truth or do not, but you are responsible for what comes of either."

America stared at her. "Finished?"

"I can keep going," the zip-tied woman said, half-breathlessly.

"Please don't." America checked her phone to see how pissed Nikole was.

 **Nikole** : go fuck urself andrea  
 **Nikole** : also shes at this party  
 **Nikole** : im just saying  
 **Nikole** : give the lady some credit  
 **Nikole** : they didnt let her in the fbi just bc shes pretty  
 **Nikole** : she is btw  
 **Nikole** : [photo attached]

You know what, fuck it, maybe zip-tie lady had a point. America couldn't tell Nikole _why_ she was so against the FBI coming to dinner without bringing up the 'hey, so about everything you know about me' thing. And she… couldn't do that. How were you even supposed to start that conversation?

Nikole didn't seem to have anyone but America — when was the last time she'd actually been excited about the prospect of hanging out with someone? Even if it was a _terrible_ idea, it felt cruel to tell her she couldn't have a friend. Nikole was a grown-ass adult. If she wanted to take that kind of risk, it was her own goddamn choice.

Anyway, what was the worst that could happen? They could get arrested and sent to different prisons, but it was one way of coming clean about her job (and, America's anxiety informed her happily, she wouldn't be there for the fallout). They could exchange letters, probably, if Nikole still wanted to talk to her.

 **America** : Whatever. I'll be home Saturday night

She stuffed her phone back in her pocket and started sifting through boxes again, in silence. In the fifth, she found the crystal statuette. It wasn't even all that pretty.

"Well," said America, "I'm out of here, zip-tie lady." She threw the woman her box cutter.

"Farzanah," the woman corrected. Between the concussion and the zip-ties, she didn't manage to catch it, but it landed near her feet. "For what it is worth, I pray you are able to fix things with your wife."

"Yeah, thanks for the vote of support."

⁂

She'd meant to talk to Nikole. To apologize, at least, or maybe come up with some reason she was so uncomfortable about this without blowing her cover or acting like Nikole was incapable of making her own decisions. But it had been almost midnight by the time she'd dragged herself out of the taxi and in the door, and the next morning she hadn't seen Nikole until Nikole had staggered in the door weighed down by three huge grocery bags. She'd barely glanced at America when she'd had offered to help put things away, then she'd put headphones on and spent the rest of the day cooking. So that was that.

Their dining room was tucked into a corner of the house, with floor to ceiling windows on two walls, a backdoor to the porch on a third, and then a tiny walled-in kitchen that made the turn into the living room more interesting than a 90 degree angle. The windows were framed with curtains that draped artistically across the top and were framed with this complicated navy pattern that Nikole had practically _vibrated_ over when she'd first seen it, because it matched the blue and white plush rug underfoot. Of all the rooms in the house Nikole was probably proudest of this one, which explained why she liked holding dinners in it so often. She'd taught herself to embroider just so she could make the table cloth look _exactly_ right.

America wondered whether it was obvious, as she systematically picked apart her cut of pot roast, that she wasn't exactly thrilled about Nikole's new friends being there. She'd been going for casual all through the arrival, the introductory pleasantries, and the first course — they were on the second course right now, and Nikole still hadn't so much as said a word to her. It was awkward and glaringly obvious, but it also made America's attempts at grilling the agents look more like a slightly desperate attempt at small talk. She asked them about themselves and what they did around the neighborhood, carefully feeling around for anything they might know about her or Nikole. Anything they wouldn't have gotten from casual conversation over champagne, or however their fancy party had gone.

It wasn't that they weren't pleasant, or good guests, or whatever. Their names were Kate and Cassie, they'd met in the dorms at the FBI Training Academy eight years ago and gotten married a week after it was legal, and they watched _Game of Thrones_ religiously, because America was cursed to live her life surrounded by people who thought that show was worth watching. Kate wore purple like it was her God-given purpose to spread the good news about it, and it looked damn good on her even as a t-shirt and slacks — how did you even get dark purple slacks? Her hair was caught up in a loose ponytail, and she was holding a fork a little carelessly off to the side and grinning as Nikole gleefully described how this one Duchess' _entire house_ was the same, horrible sunflower yellow. She'd been at the party, or something. America wasn't sure if Kate thought it was funny or was taking notes.

Cassie looked like the poster child of a lesbian FBI agent, blond pixie cut and all. She seemed for all intents and purposes to be following the conversation, gaze flicking back and forth between Nikole and Kate as she cut her mashed potatoes into squares. She'd been the one to answer most of America's questions, smile polite and guarded and _exactly_ what America had been afraid of when she'd first read Nikole's text.

Like she was casing out a target.

Or maybe America was just getting paranoid. Her cover was as solid as it had ever been. Kate wouldn't have seemed so delighted to see Nikole if she was only making conversation to get incriminating evidence on her. It was fine. Everything was fine. And Nikole was happy; America couldn't remember the last time she'd been so comfortable chatting to someone she'd just met. It was Cassie, really, who was the concern.

"I still can't believe," Nikole was saying, "your father had the gall to pull that shit about a freebie when you were standing _right_ there." She leaned in towards America to explain, _sotto voce_ , because complaining about men was apparently more important than keeping up the silent treatment. "Entitled asshole tried to argue that it was part of the 'service package', tch." She stopped and glanced at Kate. "Of course, he was a bit under the influence. I'm sure he's a perfectly upstanding fellow in normal circumstances."

Kate actually snorted. "We went through three nannies when I was a kid because he kept shortchanging them, and after _that_ we got an au pair. If he hasn't changed—and trust me, he hasn't—he's probably two-timing a third of his business partners, and thinking about it for another half. He'd fuck you over in a heartbeat, sober or not."

During the beat of silence at followed, Nikole tensed: a barely perceptible shift in her body language America had only started picking up on about 5 months ago. Cassie took a sip of her wine. "Complete strangers are fine, but god forbid you tell the organized crime division," she muttered, and either everyone ignored it, or America was the only one who heard.

Nikole smiled at Kate, over-bright, and said, "Thanks for the warning. Can't say I'm surprised; that's how you make a billion dollars in this country." She shredded her meat with her fingers. "Anyway, if your father wasn't such a dick, we never would have met!"

Kate tipped her wine glass toward Nikole in a mock-cheers. "To shitty dads, I guess."

America couldn't help glancing at Nikole, even as Cassie was radiating resigned disapproval across the table at them. Maybe Kate made a habit of making friends with people not quite on the right side of the law. And maybe Nikole was just surprised that Kate was so upfront about her dad being dirty. But America had watched Nikole take bigger revelations without even batting an eye (most people had _some_ sort of reaction when Noh, an old co-worker of America's, bluntly told people they'd retired after eight years of brutal torture, but Nikole hadn't even been phased when they gave details). But here she was wearing that wide, slightly strained smile she got when she was really rattled after one mention of an asshole father, and America was suddenly acutely aware that for all Nikole couldn't go a day without referencing her mother in some capacity, the only time she'd so much as mentioned her father was when Eleanor had asked, perfectly innocently, whether she was getting him anything for Father's Day. Nikole had leaned down and smiled and Eleanor and told her that some daddies don't deserve things for Father's Day. Nikole would defend her mother 'til she was blue in the face, so what the hell had her father done?

America pushed her seat back from the table. "Can I refill that for you?" she said, with a nod at Cassie's empty glass. If Nikole wasn't ready to talk about things, that was fine; if she _never_ was, it'd be fine. But right now, she was off her game, and America couldn't trust Cassie not to use that to her advantage somehow. Better to draw attention away from Nikole, give her time to collect herself.

Anyway, they could both use another drink.


End file.
